October is Co-op Awareness Month. This relates to all kinds of co-ops. I love the idea of co-ops! We, as humans, co-operating with each other around a common goal whether it be sharing the vegetables we grow organically or sharing our talents in teaching our children, make us even more human, in my opinion. The day I discovered homeschool co-ops, my world literally changed. I would like to write a bit about it and encourage you all to think about it just a bit more in this month. Is there a way you could be part of a co-op?
Homeschool co-ops have unique benefits, like the sharing of time, resources, and expertise. Co-ops also have their unique challenges of working really closely with a few people and that could create relationship issues. In my opinion, the pros far outweigh the cons though, but it is helpful to be aware of the cons before starting out. I have been in several homeschool co-ops, large and small, many of which I set up myself. The main thing to grasp about a homeschool co-op, I believe, is that there really are no rights and wrongs. It is up to you to create the co-op that works for your family. Your imagination is literally the limit!
I have been in co-ops with just 3 families and then I’ve been in some with 90 families. Some co-ops charge money, others don’t. Some require active participation, others not. Some have “jobs” other than teaching too. When I was in a bigger co-op we had a treasurer to keep track of the money, a points keeper to keep track of the points that members earned by doing things in the co-op, a calendar person, and many more jobs. So, if the co-op is big enough, you don’t necessarily have to teach to be part of the co-op. It is great for saving money, for example if you had to pay for music lessons, but instead you exchange services with someone else who teaches piano and they teach your child music lessons, you could be saving a ton of money. Co-ops could take on so many forms.
Here is the best kept secret about homeschool co-ops: If you set up the co-op, you make the rules. You can decide if you want to require active involvement through teaching or if people could do other things. You can decide if you want to charge money or not. You can decide if you will be making all the decisions or if it will be a totally democratically run co-op with people voting on different topics. No need to wait around for a co-op to join, you can come up with your own!
Many times I created co-ops to keep myself on track too. Sometimes, if it’s just up to me, I might not get to that Science project, but if I’m doing it for a co-op class, I have to get the supplies and be ready to do the project with a few kids.
Of course co-ops help our kids in several ways, amongst many the need for socialization and learning how to deal with classroom group dynamics. It is great for the parents for many reasons too, for example you can potentially teach multiple ages of siblings much easier if you’re part of a co-op. You can potentially only prepare one labor-intensive subject instead of several; you can have your children take a class from someone who might be more of a specialist in a certain field than you in exchange for a service to them; not to mention the encouragement from getting together with other parents and exchanging ideas.
I am so passionate about homeschool co-ops that it was one of the topics I spoke on at the last CHN conference and I also created a homeschool co-op package with mp3 recordings, slides & help for all the ins and outs of setting up, and running homeschool co-ops.
I hope you might take this opportunity to think about starting a co-op of your own with some friends! If you are nervous about it, start small and you can grow slowly when you feel ready and see a need to do so.
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