Friday Feature: Petrichor School

Colleen Hroncich

“People often tell me it wasn’t a good business decision to pick a name that people don’t know how to say,” admits Ashley Wagner, founder of Petrichor School in Lincoln, Nebraska. But she loves getting to tell the story behind the name when people ask.

“Petrichor, by definition, is the smell of the earth after it rains,” she explains. “I really wanted a place where families could come, and kids could have a fresh educational experience.” The school is also Bible-based, so Ashley sees a tie-in with the living water of Jesus and how the scriptures discuss bringing about something fresh and new. “Freshness, living water, newness are really kind of the heart of everything that we try and do here for kids and families. And even for myself as a teacher,” she adds. 

Like many microschool founders, Ashley was previously a public school teacher. She taught middle school, high school, special education, and then 4th grade at what she describes as her dream school. She thought she’d be there forever. Then her daughter was born, and everything shifted. “I wanted to be home with her. I just, I couldn’t do it. And I didn’t want to do it,” she says. Childcare costs were going to eat up most of her paycheck, so staying home also made financial sense. 

Ashley’s school gave her a year’s leave so she could take some time to decide. Then her son arrived, and she knew for sure she was staying home. While she missed teaching and her co-workers, she loved being home with her children. As they got older, she had to decide whether she wanted to return to teaching and whether she wanted to send her kids to public school. “I knew my son for sure was not built to sit for eight hours. And I just could not imagine him thriving in a kindergarten public school setting,” she says. “I just didn’t feel like that was where my kids were going to thrive. And I didn’t really want to return either.”

She began to consider homeschooling, which she never thought she’d do. After moving to the country, she wondered if she could homeschool her own kids and invite a few friends to join. COVID-19 made things more urgent, as families kept calling Ashley for help. Her kids were still little, so she couldn’t commit to full-time, but the idea was planted. A year later, she and her family transformed their garage into a classroom. Five acres, a barn, chickens, and a garden rounded out the campus. 

Ashley blended what she sees as the best parts of school and the things that, as an educator, she believed were really foundational for kids—more outside time, movement, play, imagination, and hands-on projects. Now in its sixth year, Petrichor serves 10 elementary-age kids, Monday through Thursday, 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. 

Most of the year, the day starts with up to an hour of outdoor play, though the weather sometimes moves it to indoor play. After a snack and morning meeting, they jump into academics, which include writing, reading stations, math rotations, science, and social studies. For reading, writing, and math, Ashley groups kids so they’re working at their skill level.

In science and social studies, Ashley takes a different approach. “We take all things that the kids are curious about, and we write them down on a big list for the year, and then I kind of pick and choose and plan the whole year’s curriculum based off of that,” she says. In January, they studied famous civil rights leaders, such as Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, and Harriet Tubman. Then they shifted to science, using Groundhog Day as inspiration for a unit on light and shadows.

Assessment works differently, too. Instead of grading their work, Ashley has ongoing conversations with families about where each child is headed and what they need. “I do have an overarching skill set that I want the kids to be working on and working towards each year. But that pace looks different for every kid,” she explains. “I might have one student who can work through a year and a half worth of skills and mastery within our school year, and other kids who take a little bit longer.” Parent-teacher conferences happen twice a year, but since parents are there for drop-off and pickup daily, communication tends to be pretty frequent.

In keeping with her philosophy about what kids need, they spend plenty of time outdoors. There’s a mini playground and sports equipment for playtime. Kids can collect eggs from the chickens during the afternoon read-aloud. They tend a sprawling garden, picking out seeds from catalogs and growing everything from pumpkins and watermelons to sunflowers and zinnias.

The longer-term vision is to grow with the kids, adding middle school and eventually high school programming as the student body matures and staff can be hired. For now, there’s a summer camp program that draws families from the broader community. Ashley may add a roadside farm stand where kids can manage produce, handle transactions, and learn some real-world math in the process. She’s also considering shifting the academics to the morning and enrichment to the afternoon so she can offer just the enrichment portion to homeschoolers.

While she’d never heard of anything like this when she started, Ashley has since connected with edupreneurs around the country who understand both the joy and the complexity of what she’s doing. “Not only is it just teaching, which is its own big ball of work, but it’s also running a business and how to keep your business thriving and marketing and communication,” she says. Having that community means not having to figure everything out alone.

Ashley hopes others who are considering creating something like this will give it a shot. The local public school works well for some kids, and full-time homeschooling works well for some, but she sees the hybrid model working for others. “I am a huge believer that all families should have a choice of options,” she adds. “And in my area, this is still something that most people don’t even realize is an option.” 

While creating a microschool isn’t easy, she thinks there’s a huge need for more. And she’s so happy that she took the chance. “It truly is a dream because I feel like I get to do what I’m passionate about in teaching and serving families, but also get to be a mom and be home and let my kids sleep in in the morning and not rush out the door,” Ashley says. “We really love it. I’m so thankful to get the chance to do this little microschool.”

Source: https://www.cato.org/blog/friday-feature-petrichor-school