Microschools are growing

The microschool movement is not so micro anymore, writes Linda Jacobson on The 74. Born as "pandemic pods" when Covid policies closed schools, private and charter microschools now serve an estimated 2% of the U.S. student population, according to a new report by the National Microschooling Center. NMC)

Many meet in a home, church or storefront, keeping costs down. The average school has 22 students of different ages in a one-room schoolhouse model.

"In 2021, Tiffany Blassingame, who comes from a family of educators, opened her own school in a building attached to a Baptist church in downtown Decatur, Georgia," writes Jacobson. Eighteen K-5 students come to her for "a Christian-based curriculum with a social justice lens."

She charges $9,000 in annual tuition, with some discounts for families that struggle to pay. Next fall, some parents will be able to use "Georgia’s new Promise Scholarship, a $6,500 ESA targeted to students who live in a zone with a failing school," while others "may qualify for the state’s separate ESA program for students with disabilities."

The Baptist church also provides space for a small Montessori school for 3- to 6-year-olds, a small middle and high school and a school for children with autism and apraxia, a speech and movement disorder.

Eighty-six percent of founders have experience in teaching or as administrators, the survey reports.

A microschool collaborative has been granted a charter to launch several schools within the small Eastern Hancock district outside Indianapolis, writes Jacobson. “There’s a growing number of families looking for something in between the traditional public school experience and homeschooling,” says Superintendent George Philhower.

Studies are underway to try to measure how much microschool students are learning, writes Jacobson. But there are a wide range of teaching models within the "microschool" umbrella. "Among microschools that track academic growth data of students over time, 81 percent reported between 1 and 2 years of academic gains during one school year," NMC reports. But not all track growth, or compare students' progress before and after enrollment.

The Center for American Progress warns that microschools may operate in unsafe spaces and be unable to serve students with disabilities, writes Jacobson.

In a rebuttal, NMC's Don Soifer called for letting "many flowers bloom," rather than harassing new schools with regulations.

Microschool parents tend to earn average or below-average incomes, the report notes. As more parents receive Education Savings Accounts (ESA) vouchers, microschools are expected to expand. They're a lot easier to start than a brick-and-mortar school. But some states will require microschools to be accredited like conventional private schools in order to take ESAs.

"Earning accreditation continues to be a costly, and often insurmountable, barrier for many microschools," writes Jacobson. "The process, which typically includes a financial audit, staff background checks and building inspections, can run up to $15,000." 

School districts should start their own microschools, write a trio of former superintendents on The 74. "These small, purpose-built, learning environments give public schools and their communities the power to design experiences that are deeply personalized, flexible, and malleable without waiting for entire systems to shift, write Deborah A. Gist, Tom Vander Ark and Devin Vodicka.

Their groups -- Getting Smart Collective, Learner-Centered Collaborative, and Transcend -- are "designing, launching, and supporting microschools," they write. "We came together to create the Public Microschool Playbook."