Traditional schooling is not for every kid or every family. Our conversation today is with Vanessa Knight, a local mom who found this to be true for her own family, and started an organization to create community among other families like hers called AnySchoolers.

AnySchoolers is one of Vanessa's heart projects after seeing that the world of schooling outside the traditional classroom needed a networking and connections infrastructure. "With what we know about how adaptive the brain is, how it learns, what the ideal environment is for learning, our society needs to think about educating children in a completely different way. Learning happens anytime, anywhere, with anyone, so we actually actively limit opportunities for exploration, adaptation and curiosity when we limit learning to a building/classroom. I do believe that this is part of the reason that we see many of the issues in our society that most parents are concerned about."



AnySchoolers is a grassroots 501c3 nonprofit organization with the goal of national advocacy, resourcing, & connection on several levels for families who want to educate secularly outside of or in hybrid collaboration with the traditional school system. It was founded in 2022 by two seasoned parents, a mental health professional (Vanessa) and an education professional, working together to imagine a new community with no barriers to participation, safety on every level, and reciprocity between families.

AnySchoolers families are preschoolers, virtual and hybrid schoolers, world schoolers, road schoolers, forest/farm/fine arts schoolers, homeschoolers, traveling schoolers, families who have children both in and out of traditional school and everything in between. They are widening the scope of how, with whom, and where learning happens - not just within the walls of a school building. AnySchoolers are also widening their reach to new communities around the United States and abroad.

Our guest, Vanessa, is a 44 year old mother of four ages 18 to 8, a professional counselor and owner of a Kansas City counseling practice, Secure, that has served the metro for 15+ years. Vanessa studied music, art and writing for her bachelors degrees, which evolved to psychology and counseling for higher ed. Vanessa and her family live most of the time in the Historic Northeast of KC, and also live part time in Belize, Central America. In KC, the Knights have an urban microfarm with fruit trees, flowers and vegetables growing, chickens, and all the things that go with them. Vanessa has a special love of the natural world and has several side projects, including training to teach Morning Altars, primate studies, and embroidering on the go.



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