Anyone have any experience w/a co-op preschool? I toured one today that I liked, and the thought of being so involved in my LO's school really appeals to me.
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Our choices of preschool here are between a co-op and regular public preschool. We will tour both but are actually leaning towards the public one only because of the scheduling part of it.
ETA: but I hear lots of good things about our co-op!
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What's a co-op preschool?
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DD goes to a co-op preschool and this was our first experience with one. They are fairly common here. Overall, it was a great experience. I really loved being in the classroom, and it was a great way to get to know DD's teachers and the kids and the families of the kids as well. It made for a really nice community, and DD's class had regular playdates outside of school. Since she was in a 2-day/week program and there were 10 kids, each family ended up co-oping a little less than once a month. At the beginning of the year it was a little overwhelming because her class wasn't full right away (so there weren't as many parents to rotate) but by the end of the year some parents were asking if others were willing to give up their co-op day because they enjoyed it so much. We were required to bring snack on co-op days.
I will say, that since the preschool is run by families (it has a director, the teachers are hired, but the families make up the board, etc) there can be a lot more asked of you throughout the year (clean up days, fundraisers, parent meetings, etc). I'm sure some of that will depend on your particular school. But it does make for a very nice community, and I have been very glad to be part of it.
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We could never consider one because ours require parental involvement during the school day. Simply impossible for us. We require aftercare as it is. We felt it was basically only open to stay at home parents.
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My friend who was a teacher before becoming a SAHM is doing co-op preschool for her 3 year old. She likes being involved and at least in my area the co-op schools are high quality but have lower costs bc of parent involvement
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@locavore_mama: I actually hadn't heard of these until pretty recently, but in a co-op preschool, the parents are involved in running the school. The way I understand it, each parent is required to hold a "job" within the school (ex: fundraising), they help with cleaning the school, and they are also required to help out within the classroom a couple times a month.
@Mrs. Jacks: definitely, if I was working, it would be very difficult to have her attend a co-op! It seems like it's a pretty big time commitment.
@Pancakes: I'm glad you had such a positive experience! I'm hoping our experience will be as good as yours
@Bao: our co-op has a pretty good reputation too. I didn't realize they were so common!
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@pinkcupcake: interesting. Love the concept but yeah we both WOH full time.
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I worked in a co-op preschool for several years and loved it as a teacher. It was such a great community and partnership. I liked that parents were on the board, were in the classroom often, and had a genuine interest in the school. There were lots of stay at home or part-time working moms, but also many families working full time who contributed in other ways (supplies, clean up days, donating things like the carpenter father who built some cubbies or a mom who sewed us curtains).
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8 comments