Another way to socially distance
Pandemic pushes parents to alternative to remote learning
When the pandemic threw schools into chaos last year, teachers scrambled to come up with remote lesson plans.
For some families, those lessons weren’t good enough. They decided to switch to something more familiar, like in-person private school, or what they thought could be more technologically savvy, like a cybercharter school.
But for a few families seeking a new learning experience, a different method had more appeal.
Homeschooling co-ops in the Lehigh Valley have seen a burst of interest this year. The organizations typically offer social opportunities for students and their families, and can include extracurricular classes or tutors for courses like Spanish or chemistry.
The interest is evident in a several local homeschooling Facebook groups, such as Homeschool Parents of the Lehigh Valley, which offers space for parents to share support and information. Since the pandemic began, the group has been flooded with newcomers, and now has about 1,200 members. Some days, there are up to a dozen posts from newcomers asking for tips on getting started, members said.
Interest in homeschooling was rising even pre-COVID, said Jessica Morris, president of Bridgeway Academy, an international accredited homeschooling academy in Catasauqua. There were many factors at play: parents wanting to get more involved in their kids’ learning, concerns about bully
ing, a greater attention to special learning needs.
“This, of course,” — the pandemic — “has lit a pretty big fire under it,” she said.
The company received many calls last March from both parents and school districts looking to bring in an accredited program under their district umbrella. Morris said the company, which serves close to 10,000 clients including individual families, school districts, charters and private schools, grew more than 100% in 2020. Some programs have seen up to a 300% increase.
“Surprisingly, we’re still enrolling families,” she said, a year after the first onset of the coronavirus in the region.
The biggest portion of those newcomers were families who grew dissatisfied with their home districts’ virtual learning programs and wanted more flexibility.
“That’s the No. 1 word we heard: flexibility,” she said.
Another significant portion of parents made the switch in August — when many schools were deciding on remote, in-person and hybrid learning — with the expectation of returning to their home districts when the pandemic subsides. But some liked the flexibility enough to stay.
Some of the newcomers seem to be temporary, with the expectation they’ll return to workplaces when the pandemic subsides. Others were already considering homeschooling, and the pandemic was a final push.
That’s what happened for Rachel Woodward, who had long thought about homeschooling but was never willing to take the final step. The pandemic gave her the “kick in the pants” she needed to pull her now-third grade son from Hereford Elementary School in Upper Perkiomen School District and homeschool him, along with his kindergarten-aged brother.
“When he was home last year, it felt like what I thought homeschooling would be anyway: checking the work that we would need to do. I was doing a lot of the teaching. If there was a report to write, I was teaching them how to put sentences together and how to research,” she said. “I thought, ‘If I’m going to be doing a lot of this work anyway, I’d rather have control with what he’s learning, spend more time on his weaknesses, have more insight into what his strengths are and tailor the activities to what would benefit him the most.’ “
Her decision was made easier once she discovered she didn’t have to make up a curriculum from scratch, and instead could choose a homeschool curriculum that made subjects simple and laid out a 180-day plan.
She said it was the right thing for her family this year, and it gave her the flexibility to fit her children’s learning within the family schedule. But next year her family is moving to Southern Lehigh School District, and she’ll enroll both her school-aged children.
“I am not opposed to doing homeschooling again, but I personally wanted to step back and be able to breathe myself,” she said. “I know [my son] is desperate to be with friends again and in a social environment, assuming there’s some kind of normalcy in the fall.”
A pregnancy — she’s due in September — helped push her back toward enrolling her children in school, as well.
Homeschooling doesn’t have to be isolating, several people involved in the Lehigh Valley homeschooling community said. The Fireside Academy Community for Homeschoolers in Upper Macungie Township offers weekly academic classes and enrichment, as well as things like yearbook and newspaper in a normal, nonpandemic year. About a quarter of its 65 families are new to homeschooling this year, Director Angela Landis said.
She said that in the spring, some parents recognized their children were falling behind and they hadn’t been meeting their needs. Others were working from home and realized they could make it work.
Landis, who is also a dyslexia tutor, said her work has doubled and she now has a waitlist of 12.
“Parents found out their [kids’] reading and writing are significantly behind,” she said.
Anne Renzi, director of the Emmaus Christian Homeschool Cooperative, annually puts out information about the organization on the Lehigh Valley homeschooling Facebook page. The post normally leads to about five families reaching out to learn more about it.
This year there was so much interest that she removed the post after a day or two. The cooperative maxes out at 25 families, and its waitlist had grown to 20. Corinna Varilek, who lives in Northern Lehigh School District, landed on the waitlist. She started homeschooling her 9-year-old daughter midway through last school year, when COVID-19 was a distant concern of other countries. It was a move she’d wanted to make for a while, because her daughter’s special needs and social anxiety did not make traditional school a good fit.
She teaches her daughter on her own, and couldn’t find a co-op this year that wasn’t full.
She said she’s helped about a dozen friends with the paperwork to start homeschooling — friends who are newly interested but also couldn’t get into a co-op.
Varilek hopes the greater exposure stems some of the stigma still associated with homeschooling — that it’s a lesser quality education, or that it deprives children of social interaction.
Educational outings with other homeschoolers are frequent. Varilek organized a painting class in early March for a group of homeschoolers. She took her daughter to a group outing Thursday at Flint Hill Farm Educational Center in Coopersburg to learn how to make felt with sheep’s wool.
“It’s a wonderful world to be a part of,” she said.
Renzi has heard several reasons for why people are homeschooling their children this year.
“A lot of people are reaching out saying they’re just not happy with online schooling for their kids,” said Renzi, a former public school teacher who also does evaluations for homeschooling families and makes sure they comply with state law. “Some people don’t want their children to be in a mask all day for learning.”
Renzi has been a portfolio evaluator since 2006, and said overall, most people who try homeschooling are happy with it.
“If this was their first year, I think they’re seeing it does offer flexibility, and you’re in control of your child’s education. You can choose the curriculum, you can choose how your child is going to learn, you can meet their needs,” she said.