20 staff at Lake Wales Charter School on 2-week quarantine, sending students back to e-learning

LAKE WALES, Fla. - Students at Lake Wales Charter High School were supposed to go back to class Monday, but didn’t.

Over the weekend, parents were notified that 20 staff members have to be quarantined for two weeks after two people tested positive for COVID-19.

So the school decided that students would have to switch to e-learning for 14 days.

“It is safer to stay home, even though I don’t learn that well at home,” Grace Brate, a Lake Wales Charter High School student told FOX 13. “Better to be safe than sorry.”

The school has been giving out Chromebooks so that kids can log on to take their classes. They join tens of thousands of other Polk County students who opted to distance learn rather than go back to face-to-face learning.

E-learning may be safer, but it’s not without its challenges. Andrew Sturm, a junior, has had a hard time from the get-go.

“Some of my classes I can’t log into because they require Zoom, and I can’t do Zoom because we live in a very rural area-, where the WiFi is very poor,” he said.

The school provided him with a mobile hotspot, but it’s not working that well, either.

“We’re struggling,” said his mom, Kimberly Walton.

Classes at Lake Wales Charter High are scheduled to resume on Monday, September 14.