I am so excited because I just found out today that we got into the homschool charter we were hoping for! Out here in CA (for those who may not know) you can join public school charters for free - yeah, we are under the "public school" banner, have to do some testing, and they can't purchase religious materials for us, but other than that, I am in control of everything! We first started with one two years ago when we first moved out here, and it was such a great experience that I was will to try another charter when we moved. This one is called SKy Mountain, and it is more of an umbrella than a traditional charter - they have no physical building we go to - we just meet with a certified teacher (our Educational Specialist) once a month and in exchange for that, we get up to $1800 per child for supplies, book, field trips, and extra curricular activities. It is funny because NONE of the families in our homeschool group have even heard of this charter, so they are asking me for feedback to see if they want to check it out - I'm the giunea pig! The good news is our ES seems super nice and we are going to meet with her next week at the library so she can meet the kids and we can fill out paperwork. Then I can give her my book list from Rainbow Resource and a few other sites, and we are good to go. I am so geeked! Now I just need to balance our schedule so we can do all the fun stuff that is on the vendor list! I am writing our lesson plans now, so we should be good to go by the third week of August! Thank you GOD!!!!
Wow! Sounds like quite the deal! I wish our school district would give me $$ for curriculum. That is so great for your family!
how awesome! I have had to do this on such a tight budget that I wouldn't even know how to spend $1800 on each kid for their education... have fun shopping!!!
More Woot! We just had our first meeting with our ES and she is so sweet. She came in with some math and writing activities for the kids and filled out all the paperwork. I need to email her our list of curriculum tonight, and scan in my ds' vaccination records - even though I KNOW I sent them, his were never all on one sheet (not all nice and pretty) so I can understand the confusion. But that is about it. Now I get to order all our curriculum, so I should have that in about 2-3 weeks. Then I can finish getting all the lesson plans together for the year! Yay!! I am pretty excited! I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it all continues to go well.
So can the curriculum be from a religious company?? This sounds very cool to me I'd LOVE the money to spend like that - LOL. I could go on some cool field trips if I had money
Chicamarun - I can use religious curriculum, but *I* have to pay for that - so a lot of my lesson plans I pay for, but most where already purchased for my son, so I get science experiment stuff, workbooks, and stuff like that through the charter. I have to buy ds' history text for this year, since we are using From Sea to Shining Sea, and that is a Catholic text, and I am teaching for a christian co-op, and even though I get a small stipend, I have to pay for my kids classes and get reimbursed through the co-op - I can't use my funds for that because it is Christian. But, the good news is they have no issue with me USING all that material - I just need to show and turn in paperwork from the stuff the charter has paid for, so I just keep a stack of "secular" work just for them. Even though they can't pay for the religious materials, I still get to use them, and that is what is important to me! THis charter gives extra funds since they have no learning center - they give more so the family can find local educational classes and activities in their community - so it gives me a lot of flexibility. SO, as a result, it saves me a LOT of money (which is a bit tight when i am not working) and lets us do more than we could other wise!
We have a program like that. It used to let us purchase religious materials, not any more. Now we can't count our time using Relig materials. It is still a great program. We can use our funds to do piano lessons, sign lang. art materials, pencils, pens, swimming lessons, secular curriculum, and they offer lots of classes. My DH just went to work for them and is also going to teach some Photography classes. It is very helpfull just not as good as it used to be. Hope it all works out for you!! Have Fun!
I've heard that from many people. They let you buy religious materials, then a year or two down the road telll you no more. They count the time using religious materials for a while, then tell you no more. Don't know if that is done intentionally, or if the rules changed at one point. Either way, if it works for you even with the strings attached, go for it!
There was a group of people taking them to court if they didn't change. I am really sad that it worked that way. It still helps with our supplemental stuff though. We always have plenty of hours at the end of the year. I still use my religous stuff I just can't count the hours.
That is one reason I am pleased with the Charters in CA - at least the ones I have worked with. *I* get to determine what "time" is spent on which school work. Many charters will let you do it all yourself if you want - but they are good for those who are new or unfamiliar with homeschooling and want help - writing lesson plans, picking curriculum, etc. I can use all the religious material I want - they don't seem to care if the math is from a religious text or not. Is the kid learning math? Good! That bait-and-switch system is pretty crappy. I would most likely pull my kid out of a school that tried to dictate to me like that. There was a charter out here that we looked into, but the minute I said I had an 8th grader, they were all over the "we will pick for you" line, and I was out of there! So it all does depend on the charter school.
They know I am using relig curriculum so most of my hours are from art and home ec and reading. We have to have 720 hours in a year. No specific subjects. So it really isn't too bad. I did consider leaving but $2150.00 per year is pretty nice to try some different things like pottery, chalkdust math, a variety of things we just can't afford to do. We have to make a learning plan that includes anything that we plan do do for the year (secular) it can be changed all through the year. We get to pick what we want to do as long as it is secular I hope and pray I made the right decision. I hope it goes well for you I bet you find some neat classes and things for your kids. Congrats on getting to use religous curriculum. I hope it stays that way.
