GoBigEd

Posted 9:29 AM by Susan Darst Williams

HOW TO START A 'NEW SCHOOL OLD SCHOOL'

A reader whose child’s small country school is now effectively doomed by Nebraska’s education bureaucracy has asked for information on how to start a private school.

If the Nebraska Supreme Court, the Nebraska Legislature, the Nebraska Department of Education and the Nebraska State Teachers Association all find the Class I, elementary-only, rural schools so objectionable as to cut off their funding and legislate them out of existence, that might just be the smartest way to play: take your ball and go home.

Or in this case, take over the reins of your child’s education once and for all, and never let the educrats make the rules again.

A one-room schoolhouse for the 21st Century! It’s an exciting prospect.

Returning to the “old school” format – parent-driven, parent-designed and parent-managed grade schools – with today’s “new school” innovations and improvements, from distance learning to the Internet to flexible scheduling – might be the best thing that’s happened in education in a long time.

Of course, any parent-driven school must still adhere to basic fire, safety and business rules. But beyond that, how do you do it? It’s not an easy job . . . but it must certainly be enormously fulfilling, especially when the curriculum and instructional methods chosen by the parents and the teachers wallop the academic achievement of the kids in the government schools, as happens all over the world.

Today and tomorrow, Go Big Ed will try to offer resources and tips on how to start and pay for a small private school or multifamily homeschool. To get started, here’s the lay of the land on private education from Go Big Ed’s Encyclopedia of Education, found on the left side of the homepage on www.GoBigEd.com:

Private education:

www.capenet.org (Council for American Private Education)
www.nais.org (National Association of Independent Schools)
www.acsi.org (Association of Christian Schools International)
www.ncea.org (National Catholic Educational Association)
www.naes.org (National Association of Episcopal Schools)
www.elca.org/schools (Lutheran schools -- ELCA)
www.lcms.org/pages/default.asp?NavID=1694 (Lutheran schools - Mo. Synod)
www.amshq.org (American Montessori Society schools)
www.montessori-ami.org (Association Montessori Internationale schools)
www.ravsak.org (Network of Jewish Community Day Schools)
http://mediaguidetoislam.sfsu.edu/intheus/04c_youth.htm (Muslim education)
www.ncgs.org (National Coalition of Girls' Schools)
www.privateschools.about.com
www.nces.ed.gov/globallocator/
www.petersons.com
www.ncgs.org (National Coalition of Girls' Schools)

Private scholarships (see also School choice):

www.scholarshipfund.org (a national Children's Scholarship Fund)
www.ceofoundation.org (San Antonio and beyond)
www.pave.org (Milwaukee)
http://hooverdigest.org (search for private scholarships K-12)
http://www.pfaw.org/pfaw/general/default.aspx?oid=5094 (opposition from People For the American Way)

Private school management / providers / franchisers:

www.isminc.com
www.face.net
www.edisonschools.com
http://slate.msn.com/toolbar.aspx?action=read&id=2070329

Private schools, excellent:

www.hillsdale.edu/academy
www.calvertschool.org
www.lawrenceville.org
www.giftedschool.org
www.cardenschool.org
www.latinschool.org
www.andover.edu
www.BoardingSchoolReview.com

Privatization:

www.sutherlandinstitute.org (report, "Saving Education and Ourselves: The Moral Case for Self-Reliance in Education")
www.heartland.org (search "school privatization")
www.reason.org (search "school privatization")
www.honestedu.org
www.exodusmandate.org
www.strike-the-root.com