Pandemic & Education

Small Majority of Parents Say: Open Up Our School Campuses!

• By Dian Schaffhauser
• 08/24/20

A slight majority of parents want schools to reopen this fall for in-person learning, and conservatives especially want that to happen. Fifty-five percent of people nationwide told WalletHub researchers schools needed to open their campuses. A third of respondents (32 percent) said it wasn't possible for them to work from home. But the main reason why parents said it was important for schools to reopen was, according to four in five respondents, for "kids' development"; just 10 percent said it was so parents could go back to work.

The survey asked 1,200 parents a set of questions between July 21 and 28, 2020. WalletHub is a personal finance company that helps people improve their credit scores and is owned by a financial services company.

Two-thirds of parents said the biggest reason not to reopen schools had to do with "public health" concerns.

Responses from parents were divided among political affiliation. While two-thirds of conservative parents agreed with the current administration that schools should re-open, less than half of liberal parents concurred. And between the sexes, 31 percent more fathers than mothers want school campuses open for in-person learning.

More complete details on survey results are available on the WalletHub website.