海角大神

A month ago, Brad Thorpe had never heard of a learning pod.聽

Within a week, the Toronto father was busy converting a spinning room at a gym he owns into a classroom for his sixth grade daughter and seven classmates.

The entrepreneur who holds 15 patents describes himself as a 鈥渟olutions guy鈥� who had a problem: Schools are opening across Ontario Sept. 15, but with 27 students per class in his daughter鈥檚 age range, he worried about the school鈥檚 ability to maintain social distancing. So he hired an Ontario-certified teacher, shaped a curriculum, and 鈥渋n a day and on a dollar鈥� created a website launching the Girls Only Academy.

That kind of entrepreneurial spirit has undergirded the rise of a 鈥渕icro-schooling鈥� movement across North America, where parents are coupling with other families to offer an alternative to in-class schooling they feel is unsafe or remote learning that they feel is inadequate.聽

Across the United States and Canada, families are experimenting with alternative schooling arrangements. Parents are taking to Facebook to inquire about tuition models, insurance policies, and potential podmates for their children while tutors and teachers offer their services. Start-ups are offering new platforms, hoping to tap the emerging market built by parents who say they are hustling to do whatever they can for their children this academic year.

But Mr. Thorpe says he鈥檚 had every insult lodged at him from opportunistic to elitist. His favorite: 鈥渄isaster capitalist.鈥澛�

In fact, many parents, education experts, and community advocates worry that 鈥減andemic pods鈥� could have unintended consequences that further widen gaps in achievement between socioeconomic groups. The conversation has surfaced new thinking about those long-standing inequities 鈥� examining people鈥檚 own privileges and access 鈥� that have long persisted but may not have been as overtly apparent.聽

鈥淭hese pods are highlighting the kind of advantages that some have over others that are less visible maybe when there鈥檚 not a pandemic occurring,鈥� says Agata Soroko, a doctoral candidate and part-time professor in the faculty of education at the University of Ottawa. 鈥淲e鈥檙e often told that we live in a meritocracy and every person has an equal opportunity to succeed,鈥� she adds. 鈥淭hese pandemic pods are troubling this narrative and bringing into light the inequities that various communities face.鈥�

On the northwest corner of Toronto 鈥� far from the neighborhood where Mr. Thorpe was assembling desks past midnight the other night 鈥� Anna-Kay Brown was doing her own organizing. Her community event would highlight inequities in housing, schooling, and public transport. She, like Mr. Thorpe, has struggled with what to do with her two school-age children, an elementary and middle schooler. Her neighborhood, Jane and Finch, is one of Toronto鈥檚 worst hit by COVID-19. Here schools are reducing sizes to 15 and 20 per classroom in her children鈥檚 age groups. But she doesn鈥檛 feel safe and still hasn鈥檛 decided what to do two weeks before classes are to resume.聽

Co-chair of the Jane and Finch Education Action Group, Ms. Brown doesn鈥檛 know a single parent forming a pod and while she doesn鈥檛 blame parents who want to, she worries about what will happen to public school funding if this becomes a long-term trend.聽

鈥淭he gap is widening,鈥� she says. 鈥淚 believe that collectively parents should be advocating for every school and every place that children live to be safe for back to school.鈥�

These inequities have been deepening in her own community for years. Private tutors and expensive extracurriculars have long given the advantage to families of means. Those disparities have only grown when public education funding is eroded and programs like music or arts get cut. And they grew further during the pandemic when households with working parents couldn鈥檛 support children with remote learning; some didn鈥檛 even have the technology to get online.

Now pods represent a new advantage for some 鈥� and a challenge to the system. Some groups are supplementing remote learning from schools with additional support from a private teacher or tutor. Others are going as far as starting their own private schools. Mr. Thorpe found that registering as a private school was the only way to meet Ontario regulations and enroll enough learners to make the program financially viable.

Eloise Tan, research program director at People for Education in Toronto, says pitting parents against one another is counterproductive, even as she is wary of some of the implications for privatization.聽

鈥淥f those families that are creating learning pods, which they are financing themselves and with other parents, it鈥檚 not just a school outside of the system. We鈥檙e creating a mini-economy for education,鈥� Dr. Tan says. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 know how much this is going to take off; we don鈥檛 really know where it鈥檚 going to end. 鈥� Where is the confidence in public education going to be for parents? Where will the government鈥檚 commitment to protecting and enhancing public education be if we don鈥檛 have that superstrong and diverse enrollment from different kinds of families? Where are we going to be at the end of this? We don鈥檛 know.鈥�

The unknowns abound as 鈥減andemic pods鈥� gain force. One Facebook group, Learning Pods 鈥� Canada, formed just a few weeks ago, has already attracted more than 11,000 members. At a recent virtual 鈥渢own hall,鈥� members were breathlessly discussing insurance policies and pitfalls. They bristle at criticism that they are widening divides between haves and have-nots and brainstorm ways to keep costs down so that it鈥檚 an accessible movement.

One start-up based in Iran, Pods Match, says that in the first two days that it went online in late August, 200 people signed up to the free service, mostly from the U.S. and Canada. The group is planning to expand beyond matchmaking to include an option that allows pods to welcome families from lower socioeconomic brackets for free or a discount. 鈥淲e are worried and completely aware of this situation,鈥� says Iman Davoodian, who started the company.聽

A father in Toronto, who wants to remain anonymous because he works with clients in medicine and education, says he鈥檚 a proponent of public school and its equalizing aims. But he says that by not reducing class sizes to adhere to social distancing required by the rest of society the government is shifting the burden to parents. He鈥檚 looking for a pod for his middle school-age son because he is a widower at home with a full-time job. 鈥淭here are no good choices,鈥� he says.聽

Mr. Thorpe says he too was a proponent of public education but not the way it is currently operating. He hopes learning pods will force the education ministry to think better about how they spend, especially because Ontario funds students at more than聽$12,000 per year, slightly more than what his Girls Only Academy costs per student at full enrollment. 鈥淭he naysayers say we鈥檙e dismantling public education ... that we鈥檙e having a negative effect on long-term equity,鈥� he says. 鈥淚 have no interest in that. But I鈥檓 happy to help offer solutions.鈥�

Editor鈥檚 note: As a public service,聽all our pandemic coverage聽is free. No paywall.