We have been struggling for quite some time... Homeschool, private school, or public school?

We have been struggling for quite some time. We have a decision that needs to be made and for many this is not a hard decision to make. For us, it is.

We are struggling with where to send our kids to school. Ultimately we would love to send all of our kids to private school but with tuition ranging from $12,000 on up to $20,000 a year (for all 3 kiddos) well, we just can not do it. We have discussed the possibility of homeschooling. I just don't know enough about it yet to make a good sound decision. That leaves us with the public school system. The school district that we fall into does have decent schools...But... I have two MAJOR hangups with it. First it will take just a bit over thirty minutes to get to the school from my house. So one hour there and back, and at twice a day I will be sitting in a car for two hours every day shuttling kids back and forth to school. Second, we are a mixed race family, and I have to factor that into whatever school they ultimately attend. Sad that in this day and age I have to think about it, but I do. I have to make sure my kiddos feel safe and loved with their peers, and at that school I without a doubt can not guarantee there safety.

I did come across a really cool hidden gem of a school about 15 minutes from our home. This school is Kindergarten through Sixth grade, and the interesting part is that it is its own school district. How often does a school district only have one school? Almost like being in Little House On The Prairie. This morning I took a tour of the school and fell madly in love with it. We are talking about a school that has no more than 50 children amongst all of those grades. The teachers all wanted to meet me, everyone was just so caring. At first I was worried about the fact that each grade only has a handful of kids. My thought was that they would not quite get the social skills that a child needs. I was then informed of all of their outings in the public and now I think that these kids probably come out ahead with their social skills. On top of that I will not have to dread the yearly back to school shopping that most parents do. They pretty much supply the kids with everything. I mean we are talking about the purchase of 2 items every year a backpack and a binder. Crazy, right?! Because it is a small school they also allow the children to do appropriate levels of school work. So you could have a third grader doing second grade English and fifth grade Math. The teachers also have way more freedom. For example when I was there today the third grade class was having a conversation about the missing Malaysian Jet. The teacher then decided to scrap her lesson plan and they dove into a project involving this missing jet. The kids were so excited to share their theories, and the teacher just rolled with it. I thought that was so cool, and showed me how professional she was to scrap a lesson plan and come up with an new one on the spot. Well I could go on and on but I will not.

I went ahead and started the Petition process today for the school year of 2015/2016. I cant believe I had to start this early, but I did. We are officially first on the list to get in. Now we sit back and keep our fingers crossed. Not really, I still have to come up with a plan B just in case we do not get in. Something tells me plan B will involve homeschooling. So if any of you out there have homeschooling information to share, I would love to hear it!