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Many parents report that their special-needs students have gone backward in development during the pandemic-isolating past year.

The California State Department of Public Health has for the first time during the pandemic published public-facing data about which schools in the state have reopened for physical instruction. The maps show a clear difference between rural areas in the state and the most populous school districts, and private schools versus public schools.

How soon teachers can expect to get vaccinated depends largely on where they live and could determine whether the bulk of California’s students return to campuses this spring — or next fall.

Schools would have to offer in-person learning for primary students starting Feb. 16 in order to get the full funds under the governor’s $89.5 billion education budget. Lawmakers would need to meet deadlines in February and March, far earlier than normal.

A group of eight California lawmakers will advance a proposal in January that would require the state’s public schools to reopen and offer in-person instruction once they receive permission to do so from state and local public-health authorities.

Almost every waiver application for in-person instruction for grades K-6 has been approved by the state for schools in counties deemed a high risk. But private schools comprise an overwhelming majority of those schools, creating an equity problem.

A still rampaging coronavirus pandemic means schools have spent gobs of money just to add the necessary protective equipment and cleaning staff necessary for a safe and effective school reopening.

While many school districts in the state’s more populous areas have been essentially forced to start the school year teaching remotely, more sparsely populated have options.

As the majority of schools across the state prepare to start the school year teaching remotely, parents have started investigating their options for how they can maintain their child’s education while still holding down a job.

In California, surging coronavirus cases have jeopardized efforts to return students and teachers to school – a lynchpin for healing an economy, the world’s fifth-largest, battered by the pandemic.