Co-op for high school?

[Pen]

A co-op my son has been going to and liking is thinking to extend into high school years. They are meeting about this. My ds would like for it to continue.

 

If you have either had good experiences or bad ones with co-ops at the high school stage, what might be helpful to know or ask as people discuss this possibility?

[The Girls' Mom]

High school co-op has been great for our family.  The two biggest factors have been the people (friends) and the quality of classes.  Our co-op has provided opportunities I could not give them at home, such as foreign language classes and dance classes.  We've also taken advantage of the lab science classes they have offered.  To me these classes were worth it because they were often taught by college professors that were homeschooling their own kids, or by people that were very knowledgable in the subject they taught.  My dd has developed a love for science through this co-op.  She has been able to take some terrific Forensic Science classes that have taught her SO much.  The biology and chemistry classes they've taken there are comparable to what I've seen at my college.  (without the million dollar labs, of course).  The American Lit class one of my girls is taking this year is almost identical to the American Lit course they offer at my college, even uses the same text.  They are held accountable for homework, and teachers don't go easy on them.  

Also, there are a large number of teens 14+ at our co-op, and it has allowed the girls to make a lot of friends.  Some of those friends are attending college with my oldest now and are still in touch.

 

We've attended other co-op situations that would not have worked out well at all for high school.  If the classes were weak, or students weren't expected to be serious about completing their work, it wouldn't have been worth the effort. Our co-op is kind of ran more like a private school that meets one day a week than the typical parent taught co-op, and it seems like it has helped with the quality of the learning at the upper levels.

Edited January 28, 2016 by The Girls' Mom

[SkateLeft]

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Edited April 25, 2016 by ghostwheel

[Shellydon]

Our co-op is awesome.  They offer Alg.I-Pre-Cal.  4 years of science, Literature, 3 years of language and a few more  courses.  It was designed to allow parents to continue to homeschool high school.  Classes are not cheap, ranging from $45-$75  a month, but SO worth it.  The co-op has been running for 20+ years.

Edited January 27, 2016 by Shellydon

[texasmama]

We have attended a medium-sized, well-run co-op for about 8 years.  They offer some high school classes.  The co-op decided not to offer any high school math classes.  This year, several high school science classes, English, Economics, and Government are offered.  I teach the high school English class.

 

Next year, my boys will take high school Chemistry, English (with me teaching), Speech, and Portrait Drawing.  There is also an SAT prep class being offered.

 

It has been a valuable and helpful experience.

[AFwife Claire]

High school co-op has been great for our family.  The two biggest factors have been the people (friends) and the quality of classes.  Our co-op has provided opportunities I could not give them at home, such as foreign language classes and dance classes.  We've also taken advantage of the lab science classes they have offered.  To me these classes were worth it because they were often taught by college professors that were homeschooling their own kids, or by people that were very knowledgable in the subject they taught.  My dd has developed a love for science through this co-op.  She has been able to take some terrific Forensic Science classes that have taught her SO much.  The biology and chemistry classes they've taken there are comparable to what I've seen at my college.  (without the million dollar labs, of course).  The American Lit class one of my girls is taking this year is almost identical to the American Lit course they offer at my college, even uses the same text.  They are held accountable for homework, and teachers don't go easy on them.  

 

Also, there is a large number of teens 14+ at our co-op, and it has allowed the girls to make a lot of friends.  Some of those friends are attending college with my oldest now and are still in touch.

 

We've attended other co-op situations that would not have worked out well at all for high school.  If the classes were weak, or students weren't expected to be serious about completing their work, it wouldn't have been worth the effort. Our co-op is kind of ran more like a private school that meets one day a week than the typical parent taught co-op, and it seems like it has helped with the quality of the learning at the upper levels.

This sounds a lot like our high school co-op, except it is not that large.  But we have very rigorous classes, and the parents are all on the same page.  We have 8 approved AP syllabi, and our students have all done very well on the exams (which are a LOT cheaper than dual enrollment here).  We do things that benefit from discussion, like history, lit, science, and foreign language.  We've added math, but we didn't use to offer that because we were so small and most of us with kids in it had degrees in math, LOL.  Now we're a little bigger, so we can offer more classes.  It has been really good for our family.  Amazing, really.  I've been so blessed to be a part of it, and my kids have benefited so tremendously.  My oldest graduated last year, and he's a freshman in the engineering dept. of a well-regarded engineering school.  He's done really well in his classes (unlike classmates who have really struggled), got credit for quite a few classes going in, and generally felt very well prepared.  Yay! 

[mom2att]

Our large and well-established co-op started a high school "core" element this year, offering Science, History, and English, all taught by parents. The high school classes meet twice a week instead of just once like the regular co-op, and there are certain standards that student, parent, and teacher are asked to uphold. We were very careful about implementing this strategy, because in the past when we had tried more academic high school classes we got burned with kids not doing the work, or parents not supporting kids in doing the work, or teachers getting burned out after putting so much into it only to have the kids not do the work.

 

Having a plan from the start and expectations to keep everyone on the same page has been very helpful. We've got a great group of kids and families, and our first year has well exceeded my expectations. We are now in the process of planning for year two.

 

I'm happy to share our "Core Agreement" which lists the expectations we laid out. Just PM me with your email if you'd like a copy.

[texasmama]

I will also share that I decided not to assign final grades for my students in high school English co-op class.  I give extensive feedback on the writing assignments and keep a "gradebook" in which I record whether or not students turned something in and, if needed, a brief description of how they did.  I have a wide range of abilities and skills and parental involvement represented in my class, so it lifts a burden for me to be able to teach and give feedback but not assign a final grade. I will confer with parents as they request regarding my thoughts and grade record at the end of the year.

[G5052]

The two biggest factors have been the people (friends) and the quality of classes.  Our co-op has provided opportunities I could not give them at home, such as foreign language classes and dance classes.  We've also taken advantage of the lab science classes they have offered.  To me these classes were worth it because they were often taught by college professors that were homeschooling their own kids, or by people that were very knowledgable in the subject they taught.  

 

This is the key. Outsourcing locally during middle school was a mixed bag for us, and I didn't feel that I could take chances for high school. We struggled with low expectations, teachers who didn't know the subject, negative peers, and general wear-and-tear because I was driving 40 minutes each way. In the end we decided that we had enough. 

 

My younger one does history/lit/writing with a local teacher 10 minutes away who is a superstar. This is her third year with her. That teacher may have to move the class further away in 2016-2017, but we'll make it work. Other than dual enrollment, there isn't any thing else close by for high school that I would do.

[MarkT]

If your co-op will use parents to teach core high school subjects (hiring paid teachers seems very expensive), I would suggest you make them take a "surprise" placement test for that subject if they can not show subject matter knowledge credentials otherwise.

 

good luck

[angela in ohio]

Co-ops at the high school level didn't work for us because the ones available were not in line with our ideas of education (classical.) We found them to be very similar to public school courses (a lot of busy work, etc.) but without the level of accountability (many students just didn't do the work, making class time less than productive.) The idea of rigorous seemed to be "a lot of things are written on worksheets." For example, I was encouraged to give my literature students stacks of worksheets about the books we studied, so that they would "spend more time on the class." I assigned enough reading, discussion, and writing to qualify as a college-level class, much more in-depth work than the worksheet classes had. But they were so accustomed to "Monday fill out this worksheet, Tuesday this one, read this many pages each day..." that they couldn't do it.

 

I'm not overly hung up on credentials, as I have enough experience with education-degreed homeschool parents and not to know it's not a great indicator of skill in the content area. I've taught grammar to a high school English teacher, and I've watched a parent with no college degree at all teach science with passion and skill.

 

We tried three different high school co-ops/ tutorial programs over the years, even one which was supposed to be classical. We had much more success in co-ops at the lower levels and in non-academic areas, when different educational expectations didn't create such an issue.

 

We ended up utilizing a mix of DE and online courses for those areas where I wanted outside help. My oldest did Latin with Lukeion, for example, and my middle has been taking the math and science sequence at the local CC. I've found these better uses of our time and money. For the social aspect, they are in activities that aren't necessarily homeschool-specific.

 

 

 

 

[Lori D.]

My high school co-op experiences have been as a teacher, not as a parent. I never felt like anyone offering a class at the co-op was making the subject anywhere near as rigorous as I was (and I'm not even a hard-core rigorous classical educator!), so it wasn't worth taking time out of our very busy high school schedule to participate -- and DSs had loads of social time and enrichment activities through the weekly homeschool group and involvement in a wide variety of extracurriculars...

 

 

Our area has two large homeschool groups (each has over 160 families), and things like PE/Park Day, field trips, community service, and gr. 6-12 social activities happen through the weekly scheduled events of those groups. There are 4 co-ops that I know of here in town:

 

- one K-6 inclusive group, two class periods, enrichment-only

- two K-12 religious co-ops, worship time + 2 class periods (for high school each period offers 1 core subject and 1-2 enrichment subjects; none are stand-alone credits; core subject classes usually in support of IEW Writing or labs for Apologia)

- one K-12 co-op with some core high school subjects, 4 class periods (for high school each period offers 1-2 core subjects and 1-2 enrichment subjects; core subjects labs are usually labs for Apologia, teaching IEW or WriteShop, parent who speaks a foreign language offers a class; enrichment classes run the gamut -- can count towards credit, others just for social or developing a personal interest)

 

We also have two Classical Conversation co-ops here, but neither is up to the high school level yet. CC co-ops are formal/structured class periods 1x/week meant as scholastically-based support of specific curricula (Saxon, IEW, Apologia, Henle Latin). There is also a university-model school (formal teacher/school 3x/week and parent oversees work at home 2x/week) that uses Omnibus, Saxon, IEW, and Apologia.

 

For outsourcing credits, or for rigorous credits, families use online classes or dual enrollment at the local community college.

 

 

A co-op my son has been going to and liking is thinking to extend into high school years. They are meeting about this. My ds would like for it to continue.

 

If you have either had good experiences or bad ones with co-ops at the high school stage, what might be helpful to know or ask as people discuss this possibility?

 

It sounds like this has been a K-8 co-op, and is now considering extending to high school? I'm basing my suggested questions for discussing a high school co-op on that, and also basing my answers on what our experiences with local co-ops have been...

 

 

"Enrichment" vs. Credit

Just my experience: At the high school level, far fewer families seemed to have the time, interest, or money to do co-op classes for their high school students just as "enrichment", now that homeschool "really counts".

 

What do your co-op families want/need for classes? Often, when students hit high school, families find that they need to focus on ways of accomplishing required credits and core subjects rather than enrichment subjects. And, families tend to want help in the high school subjects they find hard to teach (usually Foreign Language, Math, Science, and the Writing/Composition portion of English) -- or want to be able to entirely outsource a credit. So, less interest in enrichment, unless also doubles as socialization or can incorporated as a "partial credit" in with other work.

 

Some enrichment (or, partial credit) courses that DO seem to do well, depending on the families involved:

- study skills

- public speaking

- model legislative / mock trial

- theater / Shakespeare performance

- real-life skills (sewing, automotive, home repair/maintenance, electronics, )

- social/peer -- casual class/activity that promotes friendships and social time (year-book, book club, games hour, ballroom dancing, creative writing support group…)

 

Cost and Quality

Such a tricky balance here. What can families afford, or what are they willing to pay? You usually get good quality instructors if you pay them and bring them in from the community (i.e., "outside" of co-op parents). However, that can be more pricey than what some families can afford (at $100-300/class per semester). And outside instructors may require a minimum class size to cover their costs and make it worth their while to come and teach.

 

Or, if you go with all, or mostly all, parents of the co-op families to keep costs down, what quality of credits will you be looking at? In order to make classes of high quality requires some hours each week in prep time and grading -- what will you do if some parent teachers just "phone in" their oversight of a class? I saw that a lot at the co-op -- not that the parent was lazy, but just had too much on the plate already what with homeschooling their own children, and no hours to spare prepping for a class for children not their own...

 

Grading and Homework

This also really runs the gamut. What do families want/expect? The more that a class is of high quality and worth credit, the more I found that families were willing to make time each week in their own homeschool schedule for students to do outside-of-class work.

 

REALLY need to have very clear policies and expectations in place, here. A good co-op class can be wrecked when some families are doing and supporting the outside-of-class work, but some are not. What's the instructor supposed to do? Advance policies would help.

 

"the Competition" or Alternatives

In our area, a lot of families either put their students into a school once they reach high school. OR, those who continue to homeschool, tend to use online classes and dual enrollment classes with the local community college. Both of which greatly reduces how many high school students will actually be around to take any co-op classes. So some co-ops find it's not be worth trying to set up high school co-op classes. Or only offer core classes that support curricula that most families are already using (like Apologia Science).

 

As far as enrichment type classes -- a high school co-op can be great for this if a parent has a special skill they can offer. But there may be a lot of community opportunities that compete and do a better job at it -- a youth theater group, Mock Trial, Youth & Government, local electronics club, Science Fair competition group, Speech & Debate group, etc.

 

Drop Off/No Drop Off

With all of the K-8 co-ops locally, a parent has to stay, whether or not the parent is teaching any classes or not. By high school, this gets really burdensome for families, and they really want to be able to just drop off their teen for 1-3 classes, work with the younger siblings, and then come back and pick up the teen (or have the older teen drive themselves). I'd definitely get that issue on the table for discussion as well, because if drop-off is allowed, you'll also want to have behavioral policies in place, as well as some sort of "two deep" basic safety policy. ("Two deep" is having a second adult present for helping with any health emergency, weird facility issue that might crop up, "back up" for the teacher in any behavioral issues, prevent any potential abuse or abuse accusations, etc.)

 

 

When you have a number of families with similar goals/expectations, with students of similar abilities/needs, and when you can all agree on types of classes, level of rigor, and end goals, high school co-ops can be great! When there is a wide disparity of teaching, or of parenting expectations about costs, grading, or at-home work, it can be rough to have a successful high school co-op. BEST of luck! Warmly, Lori D.

Edited January 28, 2016 by Lori D.