In 2022, we have consulted with hundreds of UK Outschooling parents who use Outschool to supplement or compliment their child's education. Here are the 6 top reasons they love it.
1. Time
The time saved by using Outschool was one of the top favourite reasons parents love Outschool. They loved that they could find classes at last minute to fill in a gap or to combat boredom when the weather took a turn for the worst.
Several parents also commented that using Outschool for their afterschool activities saved them hours of travelling time every week. With 2-3 children wanting to do after school activities, driving or commuting across a busy area to take one child to ballet or an art class or a coding class meant that a lot of time was spent in the car travelling to these activities, and if another child wanted to attend a different club at the same time, it was almost impossible logistically. Now, they just go home which takes 10 minutes, each child can jump on their laptops and join in after school clubs, and also do more of them, because of the time saved through eliminating the travelling time.
2. Money
While the exchange rate has not been kind to us in the UK, the cost of Outschool classes, and the value of them, was also in the top results of why parents love Outschool.
Putting aside the fuel costs saved from not having to drive for hours to out-of-school activities, many parents have found that taking classes on Outschool saved them money compared to other alternatives out there. This ranged from individual tutoring, to coding classes, and even building a full, bespoke and tailored-to-their-needs curriculum of live and flexible schedule classes which, in comparison to the thousands of pounds some online schools charge with very little choice in subjects, was seen as a great plus.
Many parents also utilise the Outschool affiliate scheme - called Give $20, Get $20 - to invite their friends to come join them online, and both get money off their next classes on Outschool.
3. Variety
One of the top reasons parents love Outschool is the wide variety of classes available to choose from, and also the variety of teachers offering classes and teaching styles. There are also a variety of class types to choose from, so you can try a one-time class, subscribe to a weekly ongoing class for as many weeks as you want your child to attend, enroll them in a short or term-long course (known as multi-day), find a 1:1 tutor or take an asychronous, flexible schedule class with no live recordings.
You can take a look here to see just some of the categories of classes available on Outschool.
When it comes to the variety of teaching styles, parents have loved being able to find teachers who teach presentation style, or through gamified learning with quizzes, hands on classes or even covering topics their child had never been interested in before, but now love because it is taught through Minecraft or some other creative way that captures their interest.
4. Choice
As well as the variety of classes, parents really loved the element of choice Outschool offers, both in multiple times being available for most classes, and also the choice that the Learner Allowance feature offers their children to be able to search and select their own classes they want to take, with a monthly budget allocated to them by the parent, and with parents approving the classes they select.
5. Making friends globally in small class sizes
Making friends all over the world is definitely a great benefit of Outschool. Parents who have their children enrolled in ongoing weekly classes and multi-day classes specifically mention this as a massive benefit, and one that is hard to find anywhere else.
Another benefit is the small class size of Outschool classes. Despite the maximum possible class size for Outschool classes is 18 in a class, most classes have 6-8 learners in them and so each child has the opportunity to be able to share their thoughts and have much better teacher and peer interaction than other classes where they either don't happen live, or have many other children in them so their voice gets lost in the crowd.
6. Access to different subjects
Finally, and especially loved by parents, is the ability for children to access subjects that would not normally be available to them either at school, or because of their age, or because they are specialist subjects that are not that commonly covered elsewhere. Subjects like game design, marine biology, paleontology, quantum physics and how to make bubble tea are just some of the examples given by parents. One parent mentioned that his gifted and talented son was so interested in quantum physics, but trying to support that interest through school or as a parent was difficult as most of the resources were aimed at adults, not children. They were happy to find a quantum physics class on Outschool for pre-teens so they could feed their son's thirst for knowledge in this area.
So these are 6 of the main reasons parents love Outschool. What are your reasons? Feel free to share them over in our UK Outschool Families community on Facebook to help other parents find solutions for their child.
