What About Co-ops?

A co-op is a group of people who voluntarily unite and work together toward a common goal. Co-ops (cooperatives) have been around for ages—business co-ops, agricultural or food co-ops. Individuals get together and pool their resources to accomplish something bigger and better than they could by themselves.

In recent years, homeschool co-ops have become quite the rage. It makes perfect sense. There is an ever-increasing number of individual families who have decided to home school, and while home schooling by yourself can be very successful, co-ops introduce two major advantages: 1) increased connection with like-minded people, and 2) economy of scale.

Taking on the additional role of primary educator as a parent is a big commitment. The emotional support that comes from networking with other parents in a similar situation is significant. In addition, the benefits of children getting together with other people outside their home are also huge. One potential disadvantage to home schooling can be social isolation. Participating in co-ops is a very easy way to mitigate that drawback.

In addition to the social connection, co-ops make more efficient use of talents, resources and provide economy of scale. Hands-on, exciting exploration is so much more fun and effective than tedious bookwork, but it is not very efficient to have a parent prepare a stellar activity for science, art, history and music, just to present it to two or three children who are tired of hearing mom’s voice.

Contrast that to this scenario: one mother who is musically talented prepares an interactive music lesson; another mom who is passionate about art teaches about a famous painter and directs the children as they experiment with a new art medium; a mom introduces a famous folk tale and starts the children preparing to present the tale as a puppet show; yet another mom guides a hands-on science experiment that captivates the children’s attention. Each of these “lessons” is presented to a group of children from multiple families.

You can see the economy of scale. Instead of one mom spending days preparing multiple presentations for a small number of children, several moms spend a few hours each preparing a single presentation that will be enjoyed by all the children. The amount of time and energy any one parent must spend is dramatically reduced and the number of children who benefit from that preparation increases exponentially.

There may be co-ops already out there that you can join. You may want to pull together a few families to form a new co-op. Co-ops can be large or small. They can be quite structured or very low-key and spontaneous. They may go on for years or might last a few weeks or months. You might belong to one co-op or several at a time. When you see a need for your children, find another parent or two who have the same need and form a co-op. The possibilities are endless!