Mayor Bill de Blasio Plans to Ditch Hybrid Learning by September

Fully remote or fully in-person learning will likely be the only options in September, according to Mayor Bill de Blasio.

By Melissa Wickes March 8, 2021

Mayor Bill de Blasio announced his plan to open New York City public schools "fully" in September with five-day, in-person instruction offered to every student. Fully-remote learning will be an option, but he plans to get rid of hybrid learning (the blended model of remote and in-person) by September.

“Of course, we’ll have to have health and safety rules depending on what’s going on with the coronavirus,” the mayor said in a briefing on Friday. “But it will be an entire reset as we figure out where we stand. And we’ll work with all the stakeholders. We’ll work with our health team, especially, to determine what the ground rules need to be in that new environment in September. But I expect September to be a much, much improved environment compared to now.”

de Blasio said he hopes that the city will have progressed so much by September that all families will want children to learn in-person. However, he also addressed that some families just won't be comfortable yet, and that's where fully in-person learning comes in.

While remote learning has been around for almost a year now, it's still a huge challenge for many New York families.

The mayor has not yet released a plan for reopening schools 100 percent by September. NYC middle schools reopened for in-person learning at the end of February and the plan to reopen NYC high schools by March 22 was just announced Monday morning. de Blasio says this reopening of high schools is a "major step towards" reopening schools fully in the fall.