E-Learning Requirement Could Hurt Idaho Students Without Internet

Idaho residents listen to public testimony at the Statehouse in Boise last month on education proposals before the state legislature. One plan would require students to take online courses.

—Chris Butler/Idaho Statesman/AP

Idaho Proposing to Make Online-Only Coursetaking a Graduation Requirement

By The Associated Press

A lack of technological infrastructure in northern Idaho will put students there at a disadvantage under proposed state education reforms that call for students to take online classes every year to graduate, school officials say.

“Applying this plan to the school district will be a considerable challenge,” Dick Cvitanich, the superintendent of the 3,700-student Lake Pend Oreille school district, told a local newspaper, the Bonner County Daily Bee . “Many of our students don’t have Internet access, and many others only have access to dial-up. Speaking as a former user of dial-up, I know that’s not ideal.”

Students in other regions with high-speed Internet access at home would have an advantage over students without such access at home, forcing them to set their schedules around when they could use...