South Carolina's first eLearning day: How it went for Anderson School District 5

Hundreds of Anderson students didn't go to school Thursday as Tropical Storm Michael moved through the area — but school was at their homes.

Anderson School District 5 used an eLearning day, the first one of its kind in the state.

Instead of cancelling school outright, the buildings were closed and students were required to complete lessons at home on Chromebooks, laptop-like devices provided by the district that can work without Internet connection.

For some students it was as quick as 20 minutes, for many others about an hour and a hal or more, and they were done with their assignments and enjoying the mostly sunny afternoon, several parents told the Independent Mail.

Tiffany Oliver said her her second-grader finished six assignments that related to his class at Midway Elementary School. She said her daughter, an eighth grader at Southwood Academy of the Arts, didn't like it as much and felt it was more busy work than related to class.

Several parents, including Kari Stewart Jones, said their children would have finished all their work well before noon if they hadn't slept in.

Jones' children, sixth and eighth-graders at Southwood, had no problem with the systems and were able to communicate with teachers.

Tanya Elizabeth West, a parent and nurse, said Thursday's eLearning worked out fine because it was her day off from work.

"I just hope the district does not take advantage of this technology and call off school for the smallest thing," she said.

West said she has other people who could step in if she were working, but she is concerned about what happens to people who don't have backup child care.

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An eLearning day allows the district to count the day for credit toward the required 180 days of instruction each year, with no makeup day required, and avoid any safety or transportation concerns, said Kyle Newton, an assistant superintendent for Anderson School District 5.

One of the district's schools, Concord Elementary, lost power early Thursday, and Newton said there are several schools that are at risk of losing power during serious storms.

But eLearning days also puts a burden on parents and guardians to stay home or make other arrangements.

There are five school districts in the state that are part of the pilot eLearning program, which required legislative approval.

The Kershaw County School District said in a statement that its officials were not yet ready to have an eLearning day, so they closed Thursday and planned to make up the time on President's Day in February.

The Pickens County School District did not close Thursday. Spokesman John Eby said the district was prepared to close and have an eLearning day. Its first run through the program will likely come this winter during inclement weather.

More:Anderson school district announces eLearning day as Hurricane Michael nears

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Pickens officials are more prepared for the program now than they were during Hurricane Florence and its after-effects in early September, soon after school started and before many students and teachers were used to the Chromebooks, Eby said.

The other two districts in the eLearning program, Spartanburg County districts 1 and 7, were closed for the day. Officials with those districts did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The districts did not mention their eLearning programs in their closure announcements.

The eLearning programs let students do assignments without internet access, but one key feature, online interaction with teachers, requires the internet.

Teachers pick their own hours but are required to set aside several hours during eLearning days when students can ask questions and interact, so long as the teachers have internet connection, Newton said.

All students in grades 3 and up are given Chromebooks in District 5. Students from kindergarten to second grade in the district were given paper packets with assignments around the time of Hurricane Florence, and those same packets were their eLearning assignments today, Newton said.

Students who didn't finish their assignments on Thursday will get five school days to make up the assignments, so students who forgot their Chromebooks or ran into problems have chances to make up the work, Newton said.

Early data showed more than 400 students logged in during the 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. hour, with 350 students logging in for the one-hour periods before and after, according to Classlink, one of the programs teachers use.

There are more than 13,000 students in the district. Classlink is not the most-used program. More complete data on logins will come later from Google Classroom, which doesn't offer immediate data.