Why Alternative Education?

For many years I was a staunch supporter of public education in every form. I was opposed to private and charter schools and felt that if everyone threw their weight behind our public schools we would solve a lot of the difficulties we have in our society.

When I started my special education consulting business, I began working with many homeschooling families who had never planned to homeschool - but their journey with the public schools had led them to feel they had no choice. They knew their child needed something different - maybe a smaller community, a different pace of instruction, less standardized testing, or a different approach to behavior management in the classroom. Whatever it was, they had reached the point where they no longer felt they could send their child to their neighborhood school. Many of them had multiple children and they knew their neighborhood school was a good fit for the sibling. They did not have a problem with the teachers, administrators, or the school itself - it was just that their child needed something different.

When I began working with these families I saw how their children flourished in the alternative setting. They completed their work quickly, felt safer taking risks, and admitted when they did not know an answer. In small group Socratic discussions they were more likely to speak up and share their opinions. They were more creative and spent more time investigating topics they were interested in. They made progress faster. I couldn’t deny what I was seeing and I started to realize that alternative settings could be extremely beneficial to some students and families.

Although I still passionately believe in the value of public schools, I also see the importance of offering families choice that includes smaller settings, different structures of learning, and moving away from standardized testing.

But what about equity?

It’s truly not fair that students who come from families with the resources to invest in alternative education have the opportunity to explore alternative schools and co-operatives, while others do not. That does not mean we shouldn’t have alternative options - it just means that we need to work harder to provide alternative educational opportunities to all families.

This is why we are dedicating ourselves to fundraising for multiple scholarships in our program. The alternative setting we plan to offer cannot just be for students whose families have the resources to make it happen. It is designed to meet the needs of all students and our goal is to get as many scholarships for students as possible.