Episode 90: The Quiet Revolution of Microschools and Their Role in Tailoring Student Education

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Foreign welcome to another episode of K12 Education Untangled. My name is Dr. Kim Fields, former corporate manager turned educational researcher and advocate, and I'm the host of this podcast. I got into this space after dealing with some frustrating interactions with school educators and administrators, as well as experiencing the microdiscriminations that I faced as an African American mom raising my two kids who were in the public school system. I really wanted to understand how teachers were trained and what the research provided about the challenges of the public education system. Once I gained the information and the insights that I needed, I was then equipped to be able to successfully support my children in their educational progress. If you're looking to find out more about current information and issues in education that could affect you or your children, then you're in the right place. Thanks for tuning in today. I know that staying informed about K12 education trends and topics is important to you, so keep listening. On today's episode, I'll be discussing micro schools, what they are and why they're growing in popularity. If you want an intermediate option between private school and homeschooling, micro schools might serve that purpose. This would help those of you who are reluctant to sever ties with your local school district. The current microschooling environment and movement in America is about families reclaiming control of their children's educational trajectories from the schools they historically relied upon to meet their educational needs. Let's get started. Micro schools are not really a new model of schooling. Many are just updated versions of the one room schoolhouses that existed across America in the latter half of the 19th century. Micro schools typically are located in churches, community spaces, and commercial buildings. Micro schools highlight the challenges faced as far as long term sustainability without access to public education funding or clear regulatory frameworks that would allow their continued operation. Microschools are often created in permissionless ways outside of education. They can be organized as learning centers that support homeschoolers, private schools, and other institutions. There are about 125,000 micro schools that serve more than 1.5 million learners. Three distinct varieties of micro schools currently exist independent microschooling, partnership, microschooling, and provider networks. Independent microschools are the small groups that are often formed in art and dance studios, empty storefront spaces, and other creative locations, including private homes. These are the ones that most often come to mind when we hear the term micro school partnership. Micro schools form a collaboration between a host partner like an employer, local government agency or place of worship that can bring resources or facility space, and a technical partner that brings the expertise responsible for teaching and learning. Provider networks align with established organizations like Acton or Primer, to name a few, to help support microschool locations by bringing capital back, office help and other institutional help that founders find valuable. The National Microschooling center that launched in August 2022 has its headquarters in Las Vegas. It is the nation's preeminent nonprofit empowering of the pioneering of these small learning environments and for building a thriving, diversified microschooling sector that lives up to its transformative potential. The center has members in 23 states. The MicroSchool environment is much more of an active learning paradigm rather than a passive factory model for instruction. This type of environment can lead to a level of child centered learning where which typically you won't find in most charter school systems. Here's an example of micro school in action. It's called Nevada Action in the city of North Las Vegas. The school's location is in a recreation center and library. Families drop off children and in one of the recreation centers in the morning and city provided transportation takes some students from there to to the library site. The microschool served 100 students in the spring of 2021 from first grade to eighth grade. It received funds from the city facilities, funding for personnel, support from city employees, and marketing support. This microschool shows how a public private partnership can create an innovative option for students and their families during crises such as COVID 19 and beyond. It's a good example of how local governments can use technology to create new learning options outside of local school districts that still meet the needs of their communities. To avoid legal issues, teachers in this micro school were called Learning Guides. The academic day starts at 8:25am and ends at 3:45pm Students spend a maximum of two hours online each day. The focus of skills is on mastery, not grades and students are given feedback on all their work and the opportunity to revise and resubmit assignments. The curriculum partners were prenda, that's P as in Peter R E N D a prenda for first and second grades and Cadence Learning for grades three through eight. The Learning Guides Parents and students were quite satisfied with this format. Students seemed to become more confident academically and parents took note of the significant academic improvement. Parents also appreciated the small sized classrooms and how interpersonal they were in their learning approach. There are open questions about this microschool example 1 how and by whom should schools like this be held accountable for student learning, especially if the school is not the district or charter school and 2 how can these types of schools be funded systematically? In other words, what mechanisms would make such micro schools scalable or at least allow them to access per pupil revenue that flows to public schools? A lot of the focus during times of crises like a pandemic highlight the predominantly higher income white families who use their privilege and resources to hoard opportunities for their children in times of these crises. But we don't often hear as much about the stories of Black and Latinx families who who invented educational solutions not just as a crutch to get through the COVID crisis, but also as an antidote to the problems plaguing the public school system long before the pandemic. The story of the Black Mothers Forum, or BMF in Arizona is one of these. Black Mothers Forum was founded by mothers who were long concerned about the safety and welfare of their black children. It's an Arizona based education advocacy group that launched two micro schools for Black families in Phoenix, Arizona in January 2021. BMF also partnered with Prenda, which is a well known microschool curriculum provider. However, they adapted Prenda's model to better suit the needs of black families. Micro schools often provide black families with with a safe and affirming space for their children and they specifically address shortcomings that these families perceived in their past experiences with school systems. Arizona has policies that enable tuition free micro schools, but BMF had to raise money from other sources to pay for enhancements to the curriculum. This raises questions about financial sustainability. Learning guides were hired as contractors by Prenda and worked with five to 10 students every day, Monday through Friday in four hour sessions. There were two classes with 10 students each and two learning guides, one per classroom. The two learning guides that supported each classroom were black mothers with Master's degrees and K12 education or a teacher certification with diverse experiences. The microschool eventually increased the learning guides to two per classroom and also extended the school day from four hours to six hours. Parents had monthly meetings with their students, learning guides and a weekly newsletter went out to each parent on Fridays. Arizona School Choice friendly laws offer families three different ways to access its micro schools with public funding. Students can enroll at PRENDA through an online charter school, PRENDA can enter similar subcontracting arrangements with school districts and families can pay microschool tuition directly upon using educational savings accounts like Nevada Action, Black Mothers Forum and advertised through personal networks and word of mouth. In Arizona, Prenda microschools are tuition free because of the organization's charter school partnerships. And while this policy structure makes it possible for micro schools to receive public funding, it's not equitable and it means that BMF will have to continue raising money year after year in order to sustain the level of support the families say that they need it have you.

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Public school system leaders should consider various mechanisms to amplify the voices of black families in education. Regardless of the type of school they attend, micro schools can serve from 15 to 150 students and may be full or part time learning experiences for P through 12th grade students. They provide these learning experiences at a lower cost than traditional private schools. Micro school networks are loose in the type of affiliations of teacher related schools that provide platforms, instructional materials, professional learning, enrollment support and back office support. Micro school networks may be one of the most important innovations in the modern era of US K12 education. They help to boost graduation rates and achievement and they provide high quality options that are most needed by many communities. Being part of a network provides the ability to take risks, design and innovate new ideas with the support and experience of others, curated curriculum materials as well as technology tools, common design principles that are at the core of the network model and more data to make better informed decisions. There are urban, rural and thematic microschool networks that support powerful learning for all students as well as a variety of options for students to find a place that best works for their learning experiences. Another example of a microschool recognizing the opportunity to implement all a long term option for achieving better academic results was the Central Florida Urban League's Whitney M. Young Academy, a micro school established in February 2021 that was designed to meet the needs of low income African American students. This microschool focused on personalized learning and development through an online learning platform that allows students to address individual academic needs and had learning coaches who were trained to support both academic and social emotional needs. The Whitney Young Academy served 14 students in 2020 through 2021 in Gates K through 5. In one site. They have plans of opening 10 total sites over the 2022-2023 school year. There's a need to address low income African American families in the Greater Orlando area because the average net worth for in Central Florida is less than $18,000 versus more than $215,000 for white adults. Many leaders blame this disparity in large part on a subpar educational model in which generations of children from low income black communities attended underperforming schools. In this micro school, each class or or POD has two learning coaches who help students move through the curriculum. They also provide tutoring and other opportunities to supplement the students individualized learning. Higher ground education customizes learning to meet each student's individual needs. In addition to providing academic instructions and meals, the Whitney Young Academy also focuses on student wellness, social, emotional well being and physical and creative activities. Additionally, it offers parents education programs and family events like theater nights. This microschool model may receive public funding in Florida because of the state's school choice policies. In order to receive school tuition voucher funding, the microschool has to get state approval to operate as a private school. The the Central Florida Urban League focuses only on students who are eligible for scholarships and scholarship grants. Average $6,000 to $8,000 per student per year. The Whitney Young Academy charges $11,370 in annual tuition plus other fees and scholarship grants would only cover about half of the tuition. That gap in cost can be covered by the Central Florida Urban League through fundraising and corporate sponsorships. The focus is on providing an innovative approach to educating underserved children. Funding for homeschooling has been tied to Education Savings Accounts. As far back as 2011, Arizona lawmakers pioneered education savings accounts that could be used for a wide variety of educational expenses. Expenses beyond tuition. With Education Savings Accounts, parents can use state education funds for things like tutoring, curricula and services for children with special needs, as well as full or part time tuition. Recently, a new approach has emerged. While parents can use education savings accounts to educate children at home, they aren't legally classified as home schools. They are EISA recipients. EISA standing for Education Savings Accounts. This new classification in Arizona, New Hampshire, Utah and West Virginia would satisfy the concerns of traditional homeschoolers and their advocacy groups. Some parents want an intermediate option, but between private school and homeschooling and micro schools seem to serve that purpose. This would help parents who are reluctant to sever ties with their local school districts. States can help on this front because they can foster district parent micro school partnerships by incentivizing school districts to allow small groups of parents to teach students at home with public financial assistance yet have total curricular freedom. Parents then could partner with their local schools to establish parent run micro schools. There are two ways that parents may access state funds to create microschool partnerships in Idaho. The first is a train the parent funding model that would allow parents to teach their own children at home and receive up to seventeen hundred dollars per child that could be used for expenses. The funding would be allocated through current funding streams that go directly to district schools. Therefore, no extra state funding would be required. These partnerships could be pursued only with the school district sponsorship. The second way is through an outcome based funding model that would allow parents to access up to 40% of the average statewide spending per student, which is approximately $4,000. So why would a school district agree to this type of partnership? The fact is that it would lose about half of the per pupil money for students who opt out into these microschool partnerships. But on the other hand, it will retain half of the per pupil money which would be more than it would if the family decided to home school their children in a microschool format. Parents have the freedom to teach what and how they like, but in exchange their children must take and perform above average on state standardized tests. Parents must also work directly with their local school district by providing weekly examples of completed assignments in core subject areas. Additionally, parents have the freedom to set the school schedule. This means that they may find that four hours a day for three to four hours a week is sufficient to accomplish necessary academic progress. Progress worth Noting the homeschool community has been developing solid curricular for over 40 years and there are plenty of excellent curriculum choices available. Micro schools are an excellent way to help struggling students excel because of their small class sizes. Here are the action steps you can take regarding this topic for my New York listeners. There are a number of micro schools in the greater New York City area that seem to be making a macro impact. These include Brooklyn Apple Academy, Agile Learning center on the Upper east side or East Harlem for ages 7 through 16 Brooklyn Free School in Clinton Hill for grades Pre K through 12, Freebrook Academy in Bed Stuy for grades K 12 to name a few. For my California listeners, AALT School has five of the six schools in the Bay Area and Brightworks is a San Francisco based micro school. If I didn't highlight your state, I encourage you to check out the National Micro schooling center at www.microschooling.org. these may be viable options when homeschooling is not appropriate for your family. Here are this episode's takeaways. Micro schools can serve from 15 to 150 students and may be full or part time learning experiences or for P12 students. They provide the learning experiences at a lower cost than traditional private schools. The private school environment is much more of an active learning paradigm than a passive factory model for instruction. This type of environment can lead to a level of child centered learning which typically is not found in most charter school systems. Microschools are not really a new model of schooling. Many are just updated versions of the one room schoolhouses that existed across America in the latter half of the 19th century. Microschools typically are located in churches, community spaces or commercial buildings. Micro schools highlight the challenges faced as far as the long term sustainability without access to education funds, funding or clear regulatory frameworks that would allow their continued operation. Micro school networks may be one of the most important innovations in the modern era of US K12 education. They help to boost graduation rates and achievement and they provide high quality options that are most needed by many communities. If you don't want to miss out on any of the content that I have provided and what I will provide next, then be sure to subscribe to my podcast. Do me a favor and remember to share this episode with anyone that you think would find it valuable. Be sure to tell your friends, family and your community about my podcast. By the way, did you get a chance to check out podinvox.com k12educationuntangle yet? Go there now and leave me a text message or voice message about how you're enjoying my show. That's podinbox.com K12EducationUntangled Again, it's podinbox.com K 12Education Untangled. Thanks for listening today. I hope you'll come back for more K12 educational discussions with even more exciting topics to untangle. Be sure to stay tuned on the next episode. I'll be discussing the role of community in education. Until next time, aim to learn something new every day.

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