Society is moving away from the mass production approach to life (including education) to a more home-centered, customized style. The 'Information Age' requires that we learn how to learn, thus making our model a way of the future.

A Teacher-Participant in the discussions described below.

Monthly since February 1994, conferees from 10 public school districts and several homeschooling support organizations have been discussing the needs and possibilities of shared schooling in Washington state.

Our commonality centers in our commitment (1) to public education, (2) to meeting our children with resources they need when, where and how they need them and (3) to employing our technological capacity for maximum gains in efficiency and economy.

Our discussions parallel and support mandated initiatives underway in our state to restructure public education for local responsibility and creativity. We have identified some very important pieces of that puzzle.

In addition, our success with alternative programs and ancillary services for a wide variety student populations gives us insight into various means of implementing the outcomes approach to education, which also is our state mandate.

Our core recommendation is for a statutory window providing districts with FTE funding of alternative programs K-12, inclusive. This would give districts leeway as they restructure. It would enable them to plan, among other needed programs, types of electronically distributed education 1, a central aspect of our future.

We are certain a combination of professional skill, democratic electronics and parent/home involvement, which is powerfully present, can reduce FTE requirements for shared schoolers from 1 to .5 per student and curriculum mastery from 12 years to 10 or less. In other words, our experience indicates significant efficiencies and economies from an expansion of alternative programs to K-12, inclusive.

Interlude

We developed the acronym C.O.P.E. to describe our discussions. It is an informal designation. We wanted to express the mentality which will most benefit our children and most inspire their parents to participate in the process of education, which is the fundamental activity of humanity. C.O.P.E. stands for Customized Optional Program of Education. Customized for each child. Optional with respect to the goals and values of parents and children. Program that is regular, mutually agreeable and accountable. Education as in what we all really like to do the most.

There follow descriptions of alternative and ancillary programs currently operated by the districts in which our C.O.P.E. participants work or live. You will see significant variety, local responsibility and creativity at its best. You will see parents, students, teachers and administrators working side-by-side to ALL learn our way forward into this new world we know is upon us. You will see how FTE funding of local alternative programs for a wide variety of student populations will enable public education to keep abreast or ahead of the flood of online privatization.

You are welcome to use this information as a data base regarding what districts can do and for expanding their options. Most of these programs are mature, operating for several years. All are very successful both in number of participating children and families -- most, in fact, are being swamped -- and in the quality of personalized education that is occurring.

The C.O.P.E. discussions are informal and companionable. They occur monthly on the first Thursday at 9:30am to 12:30pm. The place is, The Maywood Center, 1410-B South 200th Street, City of SeaTac. The phone there is 433-2321. Your participation is cordially invited. Take I-5 to south of Southcenter, exit at South 200th Street and come west about a mile. It's easy.

Program Descriptions

A common feature of the programs described below is the on-going presence of parent consultants and a parent advisory committee. Parents have active "ownership" of their programs and operations. This is a key to their children's success. In addition, parents have specified regular contact with their districts. Some on-site programs require parents on-site with their children. This is a very positive feature that fosters the general happiness and accomplishment. It is shared schooling in action.

Hard Curriculum
Interactive Distribution

The PASS program is used in several districts for a variety of student populations, including at-risk, re-entry, homeschoolers and others. In principle, it is a widely useful program that can creatively accommodate a student's needs. Developed for the children of migrant workers, PASS is in place and only needs to be used.

Project Running Start is a boon to everyone. It enables a high school student to receive both high school and college credits while taking college level course work. The effect is to accommodate reality, which is that young people are ready for higher learning far sooner than we tend to assume. Much of our "high school" curriculum belongs in middle school and much of our "college" curriculum belongs in high school. Likewise, much of our "graduate" curriculum belongs in college. The little nippers are a lot readier a lot sooner than we given them the credits for being. Project Running Start is so successful because it addresses this fact.

Specialized programmed learning is available in some districts. Usually, this is technology-based: computerized, down-linked from satellite or both. Japanese language is available in this format. So are innovative programs for basic skills. Expenses vary by the program and the source. Some of the down-linked programs are rather interactive with respect to curriculum. Expensive ones have video links with remote online teachers. There is a considerable range here, and the number of availabilities is increasing constantly.

Several districts maintain computer labs featuring a variety of learning activities. These are of three general types: (1) learning to operate the computer and its operating system, (2) learning an academic subject through software designed for that purpose and (3) learning to use productivity software such as word processors, spread sheets, communications, graphics, presentations, etc. When they are about middle school age, students begin to require professional software: HyperChem for chemists, AutoCAD for engineers, Freehand for artists, PageMaker for publishers, etc. These professional programs are both productivity software and teaching tools, both content and course. A student needs these to integrally advance their interests.

Materials are available for take-home by students. These range from simple to fairly complex, from low tech to fairly high.

As we all know, informal things happen, sometimes quite humorously. One of our participants reports that his students discovered he has a FAX machine at home ... so he is receiving their homework there ... and assessing it there ... at divers hours ... and returning it by the same conveyance. This might appear merely wry and brainy, but it contains a truth relevant to our story: students are working at all hours and, within reason, they need feedback on their schedules. The same participant remarks the unreasonableness of expecting a 14-year-old single mother -- no longer a standout in the halls -- to do seat time when her baby needs food, rest and cleaning, if not also a sitter.

It is said that the FAX machines between the Issaquah Plateau and the Seattle Public Library Information Service hum constantly every weekday evening with homework queries and answers. The little nippers are on top of developments.

Interactive Curriculum
Hard Distribution

Enrichment classes are offered for shared schoolers. One such offering occurs every afternoon and serves between 150 and 200 students, with a waiting list. Classes and tutorials in aspects of technology and communications are offered. Funding these high-demand activities as Ancillary Services -- current practice, in view of statutes -- cannot meet the costs, much less the need. Funding them at just .5 FTE as alternative programs. K-12 inclusive, would support present needs and give room for expansion.

PLATO is a huge computer-based programmed learning environment supplied to districts by a subsidiary of Control Data Corporation. It was developed at the University of Illinois over the preceding 20+ years. It includes course work from elementary to graduate and vocational levels. Similar material, similarly sourced, is offered to districts as novaNET by University Communications 2. These programs can lead to course completion and degrees. Although they are programmed, the fact that users pick and chose and move themselves forward makes these environments, de facto, interactive curricula. Plato and novaNET are especially successful with at-risk and re-entry students. Two of the reasons are: (1) a student makes their own way forward, enjoying the feeling of self-reliance, and (2) the computer is emotion-neutral -- to all the other problems in their life a student does not have to add the vagaries of a teacher's personality.

Satellite down-linked programs can be quite interactive with respect to curriculum. Regular productivity programs such as Ami Pro, 1-2-3, Word, and DeScribe, also, are inherently interactive. And district instructors who serve in shared schooling and alternate programs are informed or skilled in modern means so that their work with students and technology is, de facto, an interactive curriculum.

Interactive Curriculum
Interactive Distribution

The approach with shared schoolers is well summarized by one of our participants:

Our program provides students with a "school identity" where they can be as much or as little involved in "school things" as desired. The program recognizes the parents' responsibility for designing and directing the educational program of their children. The role of the program instructor is to assist parents in the pursuit of educational excellence.

These programs tend to be for shared schooling families, where there is significant parental care in the education of a child. When FTE funding is available for alternate programs regardless of grade level and physical contact time, this is an area for very wide, rapid and deep expansion of public school involvement. Demand for such programs is high at this moment and daily increasing. The private sector, alive to the potential, is moving vigorously to exploit it for private profit.

Substantial state and district involvement in interactive curriculum/interactive distribution will guarantee the existence of public education as education. Without that involvement, public education likely will take on the aspect of a pen for foundlings who are waiting to get old enough for prison. Our children have to be met where and how they are, and this means interactively, not entirely site-based, with maximum possible parental involvement and self-directed/self-inspired student learning and with FTE support for districts to do this modern job. Our discussions envision this challenge.

Interactive curriculum/interactive distribution programs usually develop through strategic planning to aid and enrich the programs created by homeschooling parents.

One program provides special classes in areas identified by parents, including science, writing, history and literature. Other activities include field trips, workshops for parents, curriculum and planning support, standardized testing and inclusion in district activities, such as vision and hearing screening, science days, history day, World Fair, etc. The sorts of programs that can be offered depend on what the parents and district folks can cook up together.

About how this works in practice, one of our participants observes:

The parents in this program, as well as the students, can have special needs. The [program] clientele includes hyperactive children, students with behavioral problems, students who are far behind academically, abused students (recently removed from the abuse situation, but perhaps not ready to return to a group learning situation), students who are tremendously gifted, students dealing with grief issues and family loss, physically handicapped students, students dealing with drug issues, drop out students, as well as the normal collection of regular homeschooling children. Even this "normal group" has a tremendous variety of their reasons for homeschooling and is not made up of conservative Christian families alone.

Most of the parents of "special" students do not like having their children labeled so the schools can get "special" funding. If moneys were tied to that, they would likely forego the help.

In many cases, the schools have already failed these families. In many cases the schools have an easier time with these students out of their programs. If the parents are willing to spend the time and energy to provide one-on-one instruction, why should they not be supported by the schools? Since school funding is a result of hours of time spent with many children, under current regulations this program receives very little funding. The school district is funding it at present because it sees it as tremendously valuable. The state should be funding it.

One program maintains a room on-site for parents to work 'table-top' with their children. Gymnasium facilities and materials may be used on-site, including swimming at a local high school. And parents themselves offer choir, drama and other opportunities for one another's children through the district facilities. District staff assist when requested in providing guidance and resources. The shared schooling parents are the primary instructors of their children, per the statutes.

Parents meet with a district teacher consultant (instructor, to the district) regularly to assist and advise in customizing the education of the parents' children. The period of these meetings varies with the statutory requirement for the program the child is pursuing. This is the point at which flexibility (alternative programs K-12, inclusive) and funding (FTE) is needed to accommodate modern circumstances.

One program goes far beyond allowing homeschoolers to receive ancillary services, which are provided them by statute. A certificated (K-12), homeschooling teacher designed and coordinated this program's inception, with assistance from other homeschooling families. It is a multi-level program that may be used to supplement the homeschool program or as the total homeschool program. It offers all subjects in which students seeks proficiency. The district provides a separate school room for use by homeschooling families. A student registers as a homeschooler in their home district, and then enters the program in this district. Each student must agree to do on-site ancillary services for a minimum of six hours per student per week. As with all shared schooling programs, it is mandatory that parents accompany their children during these hours. The program requires twenty five students utilizing the minimum hours in order to operate. An area equipped with toys and art supplies is set up for toddlers. Parents are then free to interact between both younger and older children much as they do at home.

This, then, is a summary of the programs run by the districts with whom our C.O.P.E. participants are involved. Also, it is a statement demonstrating the need for FTE funding of alternative programs K-12, inclusive, to inspire our state-wide public education restructuring and to utilize circumstances of the now and future world. We hope you have enjoyed it and will use it in your own work.

Internet is one of the greatest examples
of beating swords into plowshares
in the history of the planet.

October 1994
David R. Graham
Maywood Homeschool Leadership Team

Footnotes

1- ... what our media call "virtual schooling." This, of course, is a misnomer. Return

2- An environment called HOMER, from the same source, is offered privately online (phone and Internet) and novaNET soon will be available privately online. Return