An ecosystem of innovative schools and teaching specialists is growing in South Florida's Broward County, writes Ron Matus on ReimaginED. He is policy and public affairs director at Step Up for Students, which manages Florida's choice scholarships.
Inside a homeschool co-op's giant yurt, a neuroscientist is showing six children "how to make LED Christmas trees, with diodes and copper wire and button batteries," he writes. Neymi Mignocchi, owner of Eye of a Scientist, contracts with schools to provide enrichment. Under her guidance, students "use pliers to bend wire around each arm of a diode, then wrap the segment with electrical tape," learning about open and closed circuits, insulators and conductors.
“We’re the soup," says Shiren Rattigan, founder of Colossal Academy. "They’re the spice,”
Specialists in Broward include:
Project Flourish, led by a former chef who offers lessons in cooking, culture, and sustainable agriculture.
The Miami Compost Project, which is all about healthy gardening.
Surf Skate Science, led by ocean engineering grads, which teaches kids about physics, biology, and engineering while they’re having a blast on surf boards and skateboards.
Other freelancers specialize in art, music, photography and phys ed, writes Matus. The YWCA that offers classes on entrepreneurship. One "offered flying lessons to low-income students." A former science teacher plans to offer field trips to nature parks and the Everglades, he writes. "She expects her new venture to be more fulfilling than her teaching gig – and better paying." "Rural areas are seeing the rise of microschools, a modern reimagining of the one-room schoolhouse," write Jason Bedrick and Matthew Ladner in a Heritage report, Education Choice in Rural America.
"About seven in 10 rural families live within 10 miles of a private elementary school," many have access to charter schools and "high-quality virtual schools are available to anyone with a decent Internet connection," they write. Families have choices.
My rural District is very happy to see certain demographics leave the student population solely because the District gets much money if its Title1. The Title 1 goal was accomplished by cutting all electives...things like PreCalc, Foreign Language 2, AP level coursework etc. No Running Start in NY; the Districts won't pay for AP Online thru the state, nor do they subsidize DE. With a kick like that, of course private providers moved in to fill in the gaps with those families who were literally refusing to sell the farm. The providers were already there and known in the community thru their work with religious ed, library outreach, college outreach, Scouting, and 4H. Plenty of people willing to mento…