It’s back to school for thousands of young Floridians who are tackling classes online as students in the Florida Virtual School (FLVS).

FLVS serves more than 234,000 students across the state with two K-12 programs: The Flex option often serves as a supplement to brick-and-mortar or home-school learning, while a "more traditional" full-time option follows a 180-day school calendar.

When the pandemic hit and school districts went virtual, FLVS partnered with the Department of Education to help to train teachers across Florida. In addition, the virtual school hired 400 new teachers and boosted computer servers for enhanced capacity.

In tandem, FLVS found its own enrollment suddenly boomed, with a 35% increase in course requests for the Flex program going into the 2021-2022 school year.

In the 2019 year, the combined program served around 224,000 students. One year later, that number rose to 244,000, before leveling off last year at around 239,000.

Projections this year, according to the FLVS senior director of instruction, are about the same.

“I think in the last couple of years, a lot of families that maybe would not have thought about us for an educational choice have seen how successful students are — and anecdotally, we do hear from a lot of parents (that) their students see how challenging the content is, know they’re learning a lot," said Jason Schultz, who contends that in the virtual environment, many distractions are removed. "When families came to us and saw students could be successful, a lot have chosen to stick with us.”

Schultz said that it's not just curriculum offered to FLVS students, but through additions like clubs, he hopes students find a sense of community. 

Prior to the pandemic, FLVS offered roughly 30 clubs for students — that number ballooned to 60, with National Honor Society, chess club, yearbook, coding club and evening cooking club.

In addition, Schultz said that students are provided support via dedicated counselors.

“In the last couple of years, students have had to experience additional stress," he said. "So just having counselors in place, somebody to talk to … we want to make sure have that for all of our students.”

On its website, FLVS has a breakdown of different programs available, including the more than 190 free courses.

Enrollment for the full-time option is closed, but the Flex program continues to accept students year-round.