Families with means leave public schools for private schools or 'learning pods,'

[brooklynite]

Boston Globe

The recent e-mail from his sons’ public school district sent Townsend resident Andrew Millikin and his wife, Maria, into a panic.

The electronic survey from the North Middlesex Regional School District asked families how much time they would prefer their kids to spend learning at home this fall. The Millikins immediately feared a repeat of the spring, when their first- and fifth-grade sons sat at home largely idle during that sudden season of remote learning. The older child typically finished his week of assigned work by Tuesday afternoon.

Within days, the parents decided to apply to Applewild School, a nearby private school that charges $20,000 tuition but planned to reopen for in-person classes; there is plenty of room on its 26-acre campus for its 200 students to spread out. Applewild leaders also detailed a rigorous online curriculum in the event the virus forced another closure.

Before the pandemic, the Millikins had not contemplated private school for their children before high school. But Andrew Millikin said he wanted to see “an academic curiosity and spark in my two boys again.”

The Millikins are among hundreds of Massachusetts families pulling their kids from public schools for the fall because they believe that private schools, full-time home schooling, or “learning pods,” where a group of families jointly finance a private tutor or teacher, will better serve their children’s health and learning during the pandemic.

[SheltieLover]

1. There are also free or low cost accredited online options 👍

I would never send a child into a school during a pandemic! 😳