January 29, 2021
By Jeanne Allen, Founder and CEO of CER

“California public schools suffer record enrollment drop”

“Chicago cancels in-person classes Wednesday as teachers announce walkout”

“New CDC Research Backs Biden Push for In-Person Schooling”

“Biden Backs Chicago Teachers Refusing to Return to School”

“De Blasio Vows NYC Schools Will Reopen in September at ‘Full Strength’”

These are just a few of the headlines on school reopening that are fueling the debate. The articles and reports of schools remaining closed, trying to reopen, and of the groups —mostly teachers unions— fighting the reopening are in the hundreds weekly. The reality is we simply don’t know, and each day the goal line is moved.

The battle is taking its toll on the nation’s youth, and on their education.

A massive study on 50,000 students in 18 California districts confirmed that students who were already behind are hardest hit.

As early as July, Child Trends urged policymakers and education leaders to address the “the social, emotional, and behavioral effects of the ongoing pandemic.” But without the ability to bring students together, such hopes were lost for most.

The result as of late has been a string of reports about the increasing isolation among students, and even instances of suicide, impacts for many students who have no learning community around them.

The cruel irony of this tragedy is that isolation need not be the default response of school closures. Within several weeks of school closings, schools and families were creating their own small learning communities for students. Akin to the DIY craze in cultural areas of life, an explosion of parent pods and micro-schools, both organic and well developed programs, have been an apt, and often better, substitute.

“‘The benefits of micro-schools are a safe, energized, social environment where kids can love learning,’ says Kelly Smith, founder and CEO of micro-school company Prenda. He cites flexibility of schedules—families can choose when their micro-school meets—and personalized, more engaging education as big perks.”

In fact, the evidence has been growing for nearly a decade that personalized learning can be more effective than the traditional classroom, permitting students to move at their own pace, moving forward only when competency in one area is achieved. Reports of the progress students are making in pods – regardless of socioeconomic status – is a contrast to traditional education.Micro-schools are the epicenter of personalization. Students are expected to work at their own pace toward clearly defined goals, and can choose a concentration or focus on subjects like the arts, or STEM education.  –

While many micro-school organizations report dramatic increases in “customers,” the vast majority of  students remain stuck with poor or inequitable remote education as a proxy for school. This fact and the politics surrounding reopening schools remains front page news, but the coverage of the micro-schools is predominantly relegated to the education blogs and press. The result is that most parents whose children need additional support are unaware of this option.

WOODLAND HILLS, CALIFORNIA – AUGUST 12: Micro schools and pandemic pods are becoming an increasingly popular option for parents as schools turn to distance learning this academic year. (Photo by Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images) GETTY IMAGESThere are today thousands of pods and micro-schools consisting of 10 or fewer students in homes and community gathering places with guides and teachers helping to deliver seamless educational offerings. They offer a positive, interactive and truly innovative approach to real-time learning that is not dependent on real estate and regulations.  Such efforts are showing that for systems that cannot respond to the needs and interests of families more immediately, negative enrollment may very well become permanent.

Consider that with very little publicity or promotion at all:

• Prenda, a micro-school provider, has grown to a 4,000 student enrollment in just 3 months;
• Primer, which provides supplemental online communities for students, has a waiting list of 30,000 for services;
• SchoolHouse, a micro-school provider increased their enrollment by 3,600% when the Los Angeles Unified School District announced they were staying fully remote in the fall.

“We had no idea in a few short months we’d be working furiously to support tens of millions of new first-time homeschoolers,” said the founder of Primer last fall.

What do these institutions do that traditional schools cannot?

First, they offer ‘permissionless’ options to families. These schools don’t need to get  approved or sanctioned to teach and operate.

Second, they provide immediate, measurable outcomes. Micro-schools employ commonly accepted and proven methods of assessment, both to monitor and support the flow of learning and as a signal for traditional education systems if and when a student may return.

Third, they are entirely customizable. They can be organized by weeks, months, or by program. They can be supplemental or full school models.

The only impediment to expansive growth may be cost. Parents pay what are typically nominal fees for access to curriculum and hardware. Costs can vary widely, Increasingly, philanthropy is supporting their establishment. For example, the National Parents Union has distributed grants to parents who cannot afford to buy the programs needed to organize their own pods. Several other philanthropic efforts are supporting families most in need.

There are several publicly-funded routes too that will likely see expansion in the near future. Partnerships with charter schools in Arizona, for example, have made it possible for the Black Mothers Forum to form several pods for parents whose students were not being well-served by Phoenix area schools. That’s good news for parents who cannot afford to pay for education on their own, especially until federal and state policymakers make provisions for providing resources to families directly.

“What’s really exciting about this movement is this could potentially lead to funding for micro-schools from our school districts, from our state governments, and from the federal government,” he said. “And if there’s funding for micro-schools, just like there’s funding for public school or funding for charter schools, then, suddenly, you know, everyone gets access to a micro-school.,” Wonderschool Founder Chris Bennett told Forbes contributor Michael Horn.

That idea may not be far off. New entities like Portal Schools, which launches in the Fall, combine high school and higher education in a five-year dual degree program and partners with corporations to place students on their “campus.” This allows a simultaneous school and career training experience that may make the current model of high school obsolete. With a world of work awaiting older students and lack of substantive access to education to help them get to and through college, Portal’s model is helping to redefine the high school experience, for good.

Many educators who’ve long believed the system has failed to educate most children relish the opportunity to rethink education, and are expanding on concepts they have long worked toward.

“There is a narrative in America that assumes schooling is learning,” educators Kelly Niccolls and Rebecca Midles wrote recently in Getting Smart.  “It is not.” There is an assumption that since students are not sitting in classrooms and buildings they are not learning and “are behind.”

But it’s not students who are failing they argue, but “the system is failing more now than it did in the past.” They argue convincingly that “the static outcomes for what we learned in schooling a year ago, no longer apply. Our human ecosystem has shifted. We must let go of standardization and turn towards personalization and actualization. Our ability to do this well will be a turning point as the entire world shifts into a new way of being, post-pandemic.”

They are right. There is just no dearth of innovative options available to ensure teaching and learning are occurring regardless of whether school systems are opened or closed. The antagonistic relationships between labor and management that is turning off parents and keeping students from getting what they need can be bypassed entirely.

The pandemic has done for the globe what no amount of research or advocacy has been able to accomplish – the recognition that parents can indeed drive the education of their kids and with the proper innovations available, education can and will happen anywhere, if we give parents the tools and the resources to find it.Follow Jeanne on Twitter or LinkedIn or some of her other work here. 

Founded in 1993, the Center for Education Reform aims to expand educational opportunities that lead to improved economic outcomes for all Americans — particularly our youth — ensuring that conditions are ripe for innovation, freedom and flexibility throughout U.S. education.