Less than an hour after a small bushfire erupted near her mom’s house on Jan. 9, junior Neve D.*, who lives in Los Angeles, decided to evacuate to her dad’s house on the other side of the city. She was in the car, but she was also still at school.

“When I was traveling back and forth to my mom and my dad’s house, I was even able to join classes in the car and do my assignments, which obviously you can’t do in a normal school,” Neve said.

As of Friday morning, three major fires continue to ravage Southern California, including the Palisades, Eaton, and Auto fires. The Palisades fire, which covers the largest area, has burned more than 23,000 acres and is at 31 percent containment, according to Cal Fire. 

Being a fully online school, GWUOHS has students and teachers located throughout the country. Even amid panicked evacuations following the wildfires, GWUOHS students living in Los Angeles found that the flexibility of online school allowed their education to be minimally disrupted.

Head of School Alison Mistretta believes that attending online school sustains some sense of normalcy for students during natural disasters.

“One silver lining, in times like these, is that online learning offers significant flexibility during natural disasters, helping ensure educational continuity even when physical schools are disrupted,” Mistretta said. “Even during the most challenging of times, we are reassured that our students have consistency with their education.”

Junior Shaina T.* first heard about the Palisades fire from her brother who was working in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood. She recalled her entire family’s state of panic as they evacuated from their apartment to a hotel. At the hotel, Shaina watched ash drop from the sky, and she wondered if another fire would erupt. The following day, the Sunset fire started blazing in front of her eyes, and Shaina’s family decided to fly to their other house in New York.

Shaina fell behind on her schoolwork during her family’s series of evacuations. However, she was able to catch up shortly and continue attending school.

“[Online school] definitely allowed me to continue my education while evacuating and watching the fires unfold,” she said. “It also allowed me to catch up quickly as soon as I got to safety.”

For Neve, it was initially challenging to focus on studying while having to face the devastation of the fires, but she is grateful to be able to carry on with her schoolwork.

“For like a day or two, I wasn’t really able to work, and then also my power was out,” Neve said. “But I feel like I definitely got to do way more than my friends got to do with their public schools, like they haven’t gone to school since like a week and a half ago.”

The wildfires have damaged over 12,300 structures, including several schools in Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) and Pasadena Unified School District (PUSD). In a statement released on Jan. 13, Palisades Charter High School, one of the largest high schools in LAUSD, asked for support in finding an interim location for their school after the Palisades fire made their campus inoperable. Starting Tuesday, the high school will temporarily hold classes online. Two burned-down elementary schools in the district already started classes at new locations on Jan. 15, reported the Los Angeles Times.

“Some of my friends attend schools which did not make it out of the fire,” said Neve. “They will most likely have to [do] distance learning, or search for a new school until theirs can be cleared and rebuilt.”

Neve hopes to use her time to help her community recover from the destruction of the fires. She registered to volunteer at the Red Cross and local shelters.

“I mean, some people lost their homes and even their lives, so I kind of just feel a little selfish in a way just, you know, living my life and doing my day-to-day things, when some people are trying to rebuild themselves, so I’ve tried to sign up to volunteer at some places,” Neve said.