What's Next: How long will colleges have flexibility to offer online classes due to coronavirus?

Colleges have been moving classes online in droves to help prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus. At first, school officials said they'd reassess the need to continue remote instruction after a few weeks. Federal agencies and accreditors afforded them   flexibility to do that, loosening rules that would typically guide how colleges use distance learning.  But those couple of weeks could become months, experts say, as the coronavirus situation in the U.S. intensifies. That raises new questions for colleges, both about how long they'll be afforded lenience from federal regulators and accreditors and about the extent to which they should be keeping track of what they're doing differently.