Three Questions for Micro Schooling
If you aren’t familiar with micro schools, you’re not alone. There are numerous laws around child education — be it public school, private school or home schools. Where I live, Washington state, has a number of requirements that make creating a micro school complicated. I know I’m not alone in dealing with some of these obstacles, and parents in other states face their own sets of challenges, legal and otherwise. One parent in particular who is setting up a home school in the San Francisco area, is Jason Calacanis. In a recent post, he asked three simple questions regarding micro schools. Below is the email I sent him, and he suggested I publish my answers as a post… So that is what I’m doing here.
How to make a microschool more available to more students.
I think there are some possible options through charter programs that help home schooling families (here’s an example in Seattle https://cppp.seattleschools.org/). This often redirects education funds so that families that choose to homeschool have resources and opportunities made available to them (i.e. like a certified teacher to check in). (UPDATE: Prenda is also available to Arizona resident families as a charter program too)
How to run a microschool better.
Honestly, TBD. We are certainly learning how to work with the six other families involved in our micro school, but it became evident early that there needs to be a “lead” family. We are now in our second round of interviews with possible teacher/coach, and should have more to report on “how to run a micro school better” in a week or so.
How you are addressing the 2020/2021 educational year.
As I mentioned above, we live in Seattle and not only have schools closed, but nearly every physical and social option for kids. My daughter plays on an elite soccer club and several of her teammates will be in the micro school with a couple other players from older elite teams. The pay-to-play sports model in the US is fascinating, and also what drove the idea, initially, to start the themed micro school. While Europe has sports academies for youth like La Masia, none seem to exist (yet) in the US except rare options like Burke Mountain Academy (which has trained over 100 US Ski team members). Needless to say, for us, the 2020/2021 educational year needs to incorporate a standard of social and academic interactions in-person, but also deliver physical and competitive experiences on-par to what young and growing children require. Simply put, our micro school is presenting academics and sport as a more deeply integrated whole-person curriculum where in developing the student athlete we develop a way of life (competitive, teamwork oriented, resilient, focused and driven).
