photo by: Matt Resnick/Journal-World

Lawrence Virtual School Principal Zach Harwood is pictured at his office in December 2023.

Fostering student morale and boosting enrollment numbers are the top priorities of Lawrence Virtual School Principal Zach Harwood, who was recently named to the permanent position after having held the interim role since July.

“I’m really excited for the work we’ve done so far, and I think that we’re going to do some really great things moving forward,” Harwood told the Journal-World.

Harwood said that creating additional opportunities for LVS students to engage in face-to-face interaction with peers and teachers alike is one way he’s addressing student morale.

“We’ve done that a little bit with field trips,” Harwood said. “But I also want to make sure that when you have a student who is struggling and needs a little bit of one-on-one, face-to-face support, that we get them that.”

Harwood is also in the process of creating a parent-support group among families of LVS students so that “they have the opportunity to meet each other and talk about things that have worked for their kids” in the program, because “people in the trenches are going to be the most knowledgeable.”

While details are still being worked out, in-person office hours at to-be-determined locations is a relatively new wrinkle that Harwood is looking to add for the upcoming semester. He described it as a way for struggling students to receive in-person tutoring.

“The big thing will be communicating that to families so that they know it’s an option,” he said. The school is also working out what “intervention” will look like for students who are struggling, given that the school does not have the traditional control of brick-and-mortar institutions.

Around 80% of the school’s 623 enrolled students live within an hour of Lawrence, while others reside throughout the state.

“One of the interesting things about virtual school is that students can come from anywhere,” Harwood said. “People choose us for a lot of different reasons, so how are we offering what they need?”

Enrollment challenges

photo by: Matt Resnick/Journal-World

Lawrence Virtual School Principal Zach Harwood.

LVS has experienced an enrollment drop of around 700 students since the 2020-21 school year, when the COVID-19 pandemic was at its height, and Harwood said that he’s trying to be innovative by “integrating a little bit more with the district to where we’re providing some support to other programs.” Harwood said that an opportunity that’s in preliminary discussions relates to part-time students. For example, LVS could absorb all of the students from a course offering that “doesn’t warrant multiple sections” across Lawrence High and Free State High.

“Then LVS could offer that to everybody,” he said. “It’a pretty cool opportunity.”

As part of the district’s initiative around attendance, Harwood said that he’s looking at ways to make the school’s courses optimally engaging. He’d also like to expand course offerings in general.

“I would really like to see us look at some of those upper-level math courses, as well as more electives for students,” he said, adding that “obviously, we’re never going to have a choir or band.”

But some things are out of Harwood’s control when it comes to addressing enrollment, specifically increased competition. There are currently 64 virtual schools operating in the state, more than triple the number since 2017.

“We’re in this space where there are a ton of new players, and some of them are doing it in different ways,” Harwood said. “It’s kind of a new frontier of education, which is really exciting.”

Full-time equivalency status brings in $5,600 in base state aid per virtual student, compared to $2,800 for a part-time virtual student, but Harwood said that he’s happy to have part-time students in the fold.

“Right now, we have quite a few students from LHS, Free State and Billy Mills Middle School that are enrolled with us part-time,” he said, “and I’d like to increase that even more.”

Harwood said that if a traditional student is unable to squeeze multiple electives within a normal school day, they should check out LVS.

“With us, they can take an elective like Spanish, and it doesn’t necessarily have to fit within the confines of that school day,” he said. “We can make that work.”

Harwood, who has a 3-year-old daughter with wife Caitlin, taught eighth grade science at Billy Mills Middle School in Lawrence from 2013 to 2019. Since then, he has served as an assistant principal and athletic director for three years for schools in Carbondale and Olathe, and as the organizational excellence coordinator for Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center since 2022. He earned a bachelor’s degree at the University of Kansas and a master’s at Baker University.