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What is microschooling? Behind the new kind of education in Warner Robins

Latoya Nelson started this school last year and currently 16 students attend. The school provides nature and project-based learning outside the classroom.

WARNER ROBINS, Ga. — Microschooling is a growing alternative to public and private schools. 

It brings homeschooling families together to learn as a group. The National Microschooling Center reports about 95,000 micro schools nationwide serve over one million students. 

Latoya Nelson started a microschool in Warner Robins last year.

"I was a public school teacher for 10 years and I worked primarily in special [education] and I just realized education is not one size fits all," she said. “When I look at technology and medicine and transportation, everything is kind of evolved over time. But the one thing that's kind of stayed the same is our educational system.”

She calls it The Attuned Community School, and currently 16 students attend. The school provides nature and project-based learning outside the classroom.

"We do follow a curriculum loosely but it's homeschooling,” Nelson said. “So home school doesn't follow state standards. It's never the goal to be like the state or like conventional school. The goal is to just ensure that children are learning and learning deeply."

The school comes to The Hazy Daisy Farm for a farm learning day every other week to learn about agriculture, and where their food comes from.

Parents like Christine Malanaphy want this type of learning for their kids instead of traditional school. Her son is a kindergartener at the school, and she said her goal is not necessarily making him college bound.

"It's all about finding what they love,” Malanaphy said. “And I think in a home school environment it gives them the opportunity to explore all the paths that are available to them not just sitting at a desk getting ready for another academic institution.”

Malanaphy brings her son to The Attuned Community School three times a week and the other two days she homeschools him at her home. She said she plans to homeschool her other two children, too.

"The freedom that home school gives you is more important than knowing that he got 100 on a test," she said.

Nelson said parents should know microschools are an option if conventional school settings aren't working for their learner.

The Georgia Board of Education said it does not monitor microschools since the general assembly passed the Learning Pod Protection Act in 2021. Nelson said her school loosely follows a curriculum, but the goal is just making sure students are learning at their own pace.

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