Angry Reactions To Virginia Schools' COVID-19 Policies Are Unrepresentative: UMW Survey

VIRGINIA — Virginia’s school districts are generally handling the COVID-19 pandemic effectively, although a small percentage of residents believe their local school systems are not taking the right measures to address the crisis, according to the results of a new survey released by the University of Mary Washington.

Forty percent of the survey’s respondents said their local school district’s policies on COVID-19 were just about right, as compared to 18 percent who said the policies of their local school district were too strict and 20 percent who said they were too lenient, with the rest undecided.

“For weeks we have been seeing and reading in the news about parents angrily protesting local COVID policies,” Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science at the University of Mary Washington and director of UMW’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies, said in a statement Thursday. “This survey demonstrates that those loud voices are very unrepresentative ones.”

The University of Mary Washington survey was conducted by Research America Inc. from Sept. 7 to Sep. 13. The total sample included 1,000 Virginia residents, including 885 registered voters and 528 likely voters.

Part of the sample (600) was contacted by phone — 80 percent cell and 20 percent landline — and part of the sample (400) was contacted online. The margin of error on the total sample is 3.1 percent, and the margin of error on the likely voters portion of the sample is 4.1 percent.

In the survey, the researchers also asked questions related to November’s gubernatorial election. Forty-eight percent of likely voters in the survey said they would vote for Republican candidate Glenn Youngkin, while 43 said they would vote for Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe. Two percent of respondents said they would vote for Princess Blanding, a Liberation Party candidate for governor who will be on the ballot with Youngkin and McAuliffe in November’s election.

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Asked to rate COVID-19 policies in their local school districts on an A-to-F scale, where A is excellent, C is adequate and F signifies a failure, 12 percent of respondents gave their local districts an A, 22 percent said B, and 27 percent favored a C grade. Eleven percent gave their local school districts an F grade, while 11 percent gave their school system a D grade.

The survey results showed regional differences in residents’ assessments of how their school districts have handled the crisis. In the Northwest region of Virginia, 22 percent of respondents said their local school district was too strict in its COVID-19 policies, as did 20 percent of those surveyed from Northern Virginia and 19 percent from the state’s South-Central region.

A smaller percentage of Tidewater residents objected to the approach taken in their local school districts, with 14 percent saying COVID-19 policies were too strict. In the Western region, 16 percent objected to how strict the policies were in their local school districts.

According to the University of Mary Washington, the survey revealed a gender gap in COVID-19 policy evaluations of school districts. Among men, 22 percent considered local school district policies too strict, as compared to 15 percent of women.

Residents who have not received a COVID-19 vaccine were more critical, with 25 percent saying their local school district was too strict. Among the vaccinated, only 15 percent said their district’s COVID-19 policies were too strict.

“While many people have been frustrated over the profound educational challenges posed by the pandemic, this survey shows that the vast majority of Virginians in every part of the state favor the path their local school districts have taken in response to this once-in-a-century crisis,” Farnsworth said.

On how Virginia rates to other states, 39 percent of Virginians said the state has handled the COVID-19 crisis better than most states, with another 39 percent saying the state has performed about as well as the rest of the country. Fifteen percent of survey respondents said Virginia has handled COVID-19 worse than other states.

On whether the federal government should impose a nationwide COVID-19 vaccine mandate, Virginians were equally split, with 45 percent supporting the idea and 45 percent opposed to it.