Our History
Since that September back in 1999, our community’s number one goal has been educating, developing and enriching the lives of children from Christian homeschooling families of North Texas. We have always enjoyed delightful fun, fellowship, learning and personal growth. From the beginning, N-TECH parents have striven to live out the definition of “education” according to the 1828 Noah Webster Dictionary:
“Education– The bringing up, as of a child; instruction; formation of manners. Education comprehends all that series of instruction and discipline which is intended to enlighten the understanding, correct the temper, and form the manners and habits of youth, and fit them for usefulness in their future stations. To give children a good education in manners, arts and science, is important; to give them a religious education is indispensable; and an immense responsibility rests on parents and guardians who neglect these duties.”
Our parents have always been our teachers. Since the beginning we have been continually blessed with talented and well-educated people who are enthusiastic about teaching homeschooled students.
How Our Co-Op Works
N-TECH was organized in September 1999 to meet the educational and socialization needs of a group of Christian home schooling families located in North Texas. We operate with approximately 90 families each semester and offer classes for children from newborn to high school age. We currently meet ten consecutive Fridays each fall semester and again each spring semester to share educational experiences in a formal classroom setting. We offer classes in physical education, foreign languages, a variety of science subjects, mathematics, writing, art, and much more. Our parents are our teachers. These talented folks are well-educated and enthusiastic about teaching homeschooled students their passion.
Because our parents always stay on-site during co-op hours to work at N-TECH as teachers and assistants, the cost of N-TECH classes is extremely low. Class fees range from $1 to $60 per semester. For example, a family normally pays a total of approximately $125 in registration/class fees each semester for two students to receive 50 hours of fun and education. It would be challenging to find a better value for your money anywhere, while maintaining the freedom to study whatever you please on non-co-op days.
Attending N-TECH is quite fun for the entire family, but it is also a lot of work for the parents, not unlike home schooling in general. New N-TECH families are expected to join our cleaning team which stays after the last class each Friday to help clean the host building. We have committed to return our host facility to an orderly manner after every time we meet. Members who teach two classes are exempt from weekly clean-up.
Even if you are staying after classes to clean or teaching at some time during the day, you still must stay on-site during co-op hours to assist in classes during the entire time that your children are enrolled in N-TECH classes.
We are all proud of our program, and more importantly, we are proud of our families. Home schooling families are often prone to want to try things their own way. N-TECH is a wonderful testimony to what the Lord can do with families who are willing to come together, share their resources and allow their children to learn from other adults in a safe, monitored, Christian environment.
N-TECH follows strict rules regarding adult supervision, Christian doctrine, disciplining one another’s children in a loving but firm manner. We always welcome the opportunity to tell more about our group and its benefits. However, you need to know that we currently have a waiting list for some grades.
If you, a Christian home schooling family, would like more information about how we are organized, please visit the Downloads page. It contains a variety of forms that provide additional insight into our group. On that page you will also find the necessary forms to submit an application.
If a picture is worth 1000 words, it is difficult to imagine how many words a visit to N-TECH is worth. You need to see well over 200 homeschoolers in action to understand the essence of N-TECH. After careful perusal of the Downloads page including all the forms and information available there, any interested families are welcome to schedule a visit to N-TECH in order to catch a glimpse of our program. Due to our space constraints, visits are limited to one per family, so be sure to get the most from your day with us by making a list of specific classes you would like to visit and by writing down your questions. Visits are scheduled on our co-op meeting days between 9 AM and 2 PM during weeks two through nine.
Frequently Asked Questions
The concept of a parent-taught homeschool co-op may be new to you. This information was prepared by category to help you understand the logistics of our organization – before you join. This information does not contradict nor restate our Rules and Guidelines which should be read in full by each member or potential member and their children.
Our goal is to communicate about N-TECH as clearly as possible in order to:
- Save our inquiring families time in their decision making process.
- Save our volunteer board members time as adding new families is a timely process.
- Save both N-TECH families and inquiring families from challenging or negative situations due to miscommunication.
After operating this DFW area / Collin County Christian homeschool co-op for more than two decades, we have learned through experience that issues arise when someone joins N-TECH without understanding what is expected of both them and their children. In an attempt to avoid problematic situations, here are some helpful answers to the most frequently asked questions.
For our regular semester, we meet once a week for ten weeks in the fall beginning mid-September. Likewise, we meet once weekly for ten weeks in the spring starting in late January/early February. You can get exact dates from the current class schedule page.
N-TECH offers classes from Preschool – 12th grade. Each family must have at least one child in Kindergarten or above to join. We offer childcare/structured class time for nursery through 4 years old.
We try to limit our maximum to 90 homeschooling families. There is a high demand for Christian homeschool co-ops but we don’t want to get so large that we don’t know each other.
We currently meet at a local church in Allen, TX.
Each family pays a $75 application fee every semester to offset N-TECH’s building rental. Normally applications are submitted during March and April for the fall and October for the spring.
- Application fees and registration fees are non-refundable if a family accepts our offer of membership but then chooses to withdraw from N-TECH before the semester starts. Please read our Admission Policy for details.
- While waiting, application payments will not be cashed or deposited. Application payments are only deposited after the application has been processed and accepted, and we are certain there is room for your family for the upcoming semester.
- Once your membership is approved, class registration takes place. Immediately following registration, you pay for the classes your child(ren) will be taking. This amount will vary per family depending on the number of children you have and the cost of the classes you allow them to take. Individual class prices can vary from $1 to more than $60. These class registration fees are paid once per semester.
- Other optional expenses arise each semester for hot lunches, yearbooks, class pictures, identification cards, t-shirts, etc.
N-TECH is financially affordable because our families do all of N-TECH’s work. Our parents work by:
- Teaching
- Cleaning the rented facility after co-op classes each Friday
- Setting up the facility on Thursday evenings
If our parents didn’t teach, then N-TECH class prices would increase, because of the cost of paid teachers. Without a building to use, we wouldn’t have a co-op at all. The host facility will not allow us to use their facility if we do not clean it and care for it with a grateful spirit of good stewardship. N-TECH expects you to take better care of the host facility than you do your own home. If you see trash, pick it up; if you see someone sitting on a table, instruct them to get down.
While your children are attending N-TECH classes, parents must stay on-site. It is not necessary for a parent to be in the classroom with each of their children, but they cannot leave the premises if even one of their children is attending classes at N-TECH. The only exception to that is a board member, an officer, or operating committee member taking care of N-TECH business. During co-op hours, the parents assist in classrooms while the children attend classes. In addition to assisting in the classes, each parent must contribute a minimum of two credits to N-TECH each semester. Moms or dads can earn credits by:
- Cleaning for ten weeks after co-op ends at 3 p.m. (worth two credits).
- Setting up the facility/classrooms for ten weeks on Thursday evenings (worth two credits).
- Teaching classes – each ten week class counts as one credit for the teacher.
- Co-teaching – each co-teacher earns 1/2 credit.
- Someone teaching only one class can earn the second credit by serving on the cleaning team five times during the semester. The Cleaning Coordinator will assign those five cleaning dates before the semester begins.
You, the parent, will list preferences during the registration process for each specific class every hour. Assistants are placed according to their preferences, but also according to co-op need. Each teacher will request a certain number of assistants for her/his class depending on the class subject.
- Every class will have a minimum of two adults in the classroom at all times.
At no time will one adult be alone with one or more children. - Four to six floaters are also needed every hour. Those moms/dads report to the lobby at the beginning of the hour. The front desk crew will assign each floater a class to assist in for that hour. The floaters cover classes with absent assistants.
Our goal is to offer the classes that are most requested and needed by our homeschool families. N-TECH demands a lot of time and energy from homeschooling parents and students, and it will only be worth that time and energy if we are meeting a majority of the needs.
- Prior to re-application each semester, surveys will be distributed to determine
the most requested classes for the upcoming semester. - From those surveys, each Age Group Coordinator will contact moms/dads that have expressed an interest in teaching to confirm their area of service.
- There will always be classes that don’t generate enough interest and therefore do not make the class schedule for the next semester. Such classes are then canceled. The person who had planned to teach a class that is canceled will either become part of the cleaning team or volunteer to teach another available class which is without a designated teacher.
- Some of the for-credit / academic classes cover two semesters and may meet for additional dates outside of standard co-op dates. The parents of students in these classes are required to stay involved with their children to assure the homework is understood and completed for the co-op teacher, who is a volunteer. These parents will also serve as an assistant on a rotation schedule during the extra classes.
During the first few weeks of each semester, parents and students are encouraged to submit new class ideas directly to the Age Group Coordinators. We encourage fresh classes each fall but for the spring semester, we prefer to stick to classes that have been taught previously. Preparing lesson plans is a major task that is easily handled over the summer months, but it is too much work to expect over Christmas break. Therefore, we try to offer only repeat classes during the spring semester. After two decades, we have accumulated a large selection of prepared lesson plans, which are available for our teachers. All new families are placed on the cleaning team.
At this time, N-TECH is limited to about 90 families in order to assure an atmosphere in which everyone can get acquainted. Each summer, we normally experience some withdrawals from N-TECH as families graduate their youngest child, move away, or make other schooling arrangements for their children. N-TECH is not for every family at every phase of their homeschooling journey. New families will be added based upon N-TECH’s need for a particular teacher or for a particular student age group. We try to have 15 to 20 students in each grade from K-12th. Our goal is to limit each age group to 60 students, which means that we cannot truly accommodate 20 students in each of 9th-12th grades. As we have openings, we add families on a first-come, first-serve basis unless there is a family who has a particular skill of which we are in need. Then, we reserve the right to admit a family ahead of those on the waiting list.
- N-TECH admits students of any race, color and national or ethnic origin to all of the rights, privileges, programs and activities generally accorded or made available to students at the school. It does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national and ethnic origin in administration of its educational policies, admissions policies, scholarship, athletic and other school-administered programs.
- However, we reserve the right to accept only those Christian families with obedient children and helpful parents who have a good understanding of the goals and responsibilities of N-TECH. The workload of this organization is squarely placed on the shoulders of our parents. It is more work for the other families if your child does not understand how to obey and treat others with respect. It is more work for the other families if you do not understand how to share in the workload with us.
Each child at N-TECH has up to 90 moms with approximately 180 eyes watching them. As a member of N-TECH, we do not want anyone to speak to the children harshly, but please watch out for and stop children from running in the halls, playing in the restrooms, roughhousing, or engaging in any other inappropriate behavior. Discipline notices are sent home for those students who are not following our rules and guidelines.
- Please read the rules and guidelines to your children, so that they can know what is expected of them. They cannot obey if they do not know what is expected. Discretion is used when giving a discipline notice. However, these will be used and enforced if there is trouble with any child, including those from families in leadership. Parents cannot correct what they do not know is happening!
- Attending N-TECH is a privilege. Many homeschooling families on our waiting list would love to have participated in N-TECH this semester, but they were not able to because of size limitations. We expect obedient, prepared and responsive students who have come to learn and have fun in a classroom setting. Please do not join N-TECH if you are not able to bring obedient children who are prepared to learn and if you are not willing to work – each and every hour. Disruptive behavior in our classrooms, intentional unkindness, disrespectful speech and/or demeanor can not be tolerated.
Family file folders are available each week during the regular co-op days. There is a folder for each and every family. Items like announcements, parent/teacher communications, informational flyers, tardy and/or discipline notices, and other matters of written communication can be found here. Please check your folder each morning upon arriving and each afternoon before leaving. There will be no access to these folders other than during the regular ten days of co-op each semester.
- A mandatory assembly occurs at least three regular co-op days per semester from 12:40 – 1:00 p.m. During the assembly announcements will be made and other pertinent information will be distributed. Additionally, everyone will participate in saying the Pledge of Allegiance. We communicate as much as possible via email, therefore N-TECH is not open to families without email service.
- Please make sure that all communication is glorifying to the Lord. We are a Christian organization for the whole family and we want to be a blessing to each other. Grumbling, gossiping, and critical comments are not edifying or productive so all are asked to avoid such behavior. Instead we encourage everyone to be dignified, temperate, and faithful in all things.