Virtual school has surprising advantages for K-12 students - Should you do it?

For students with Olympic aspirations or world-class athletic abilities, balancing practice and school is difficult. Reaching peak performance requires hours of intense training, which most traditional schools are unable to provide.

Some Wisconsin residents live outside the country for a period of time. While living abroad, attending school can be difficult. Parents need to ask if courses taken in the foreign country will transfer back to the USA.

Students can fall behind quickly if they miss a few days of class and it can be hard to make up missed work. Student attendance issues for any reason can have a negative impact on their education and motivation to succeed in school.

Becoming a world-class musician takes a lot of time and practice. The hours required to achieve mastery of an instrument often make attending school difficult.

Religion and education have a long and interesting relationship in America. Many students want to attend public schools to meet their peers, but parents sometimes prefer to send their child to a religious school.

Gifted students sometimes find themselves bored in class at traditional brick and mortar schools. They can try reading ahead or learning outside class, but this does not solve the problem of class being too slow for them.

The average child is naturally curious, ambitious & constantly learning every day, whether they mean to or not. If your child exhibits an unnatural amount of fear or shyness on a daily basis, it’s possible they could be suffering from an anxiety disorder.

For students living with medical issues, balancing their health and studies while sitting in class for long stretches at a time can cause problems. Ongoing health issues can cause frequent or extended absences from school and lead to learning gaps, anxiety or even depression.

In a traditional brick and mortar school, bullying can cause the brightest of students to get distracted and create attendance issues that impact their success at school. Bullying can also create an unsafe environment for students in the classroom.

Some high school students work full-time to support themselves and their family. Whether their job involves working on the family farm or is a position with an outside business, students face the same problem: getting their schedules to fit.

For career-minded students, traditional high school can be difficult. Constantly balancing practice and work with studying and classroom lessons can lead to one or the other being neglected.

For students living in the Northwoods, in sparsely populated areas along the Mississippi or elsewhere in Wisconsin’s rural areas, school days can include lengthy commutes to and from the nearest school.

Sometimes, events outside of your control make it impossible to continue attending face-to-face school. Whether it was a sudden accident or a necessary, planned hospitalization, recovery time can make it difficult to stay on track at school.

School can be difficult for students who are often on the move from one state or country to another but are still Wisconsin residents. Every new community means a new school, new faces and new friends.

Going to a foreign country as a Missionary Kid can be a big challenge. Culture shock, language barriers and different notions of what is acceptable behavior make the change difficult for many children.