If you’ve read my previous post, you may have noticed I mentioned a few popular distance education programs, available to homeschoolers in Utah. MyTechHigh and Harmony Ed. But those aren’t the only available programs. At this point, Perhaps you’ve decided to homeschool. Perhaps you’re just weighing options. Either way, with all the experience I’ve had with these different programs, It only makes sense that I share the information with you, so that you don’t have to go through the same countless hours of research and experimenting that I have gone through to find what program, if any, works for you.
With school just weeks away, there’s no time to lose. So, rather than having you wait for me to compile all the information about every program, I am going to publish this now and edit as I go.
To start, I will begin with the two most asked about programs, MytechHigh and Harmony ed. Eventually, I will get into some other charter programs and private programs like: Canyon Grove academy, Ignite Academy, Lumen Academy, Yates Place and More. You can check back later or subscribe to my blog if you’d like to be notified of updates and future posts about these other programs or you can click on the document at the end of this page to see a brief summary of these programs.
Okay So, let's cut to the chase. What is MytechHigh? What is Harmony?
Perhaps you’ve heard about them through the grapevine and have been wondering yourself. They are Both Distance education programs in the state of Utah (offering services in idaho and 1 or 2 other states as well). They both partner with public schools, which enables you to receive public funding for your child's educational materials. If you enroll in Harmony or MytechHigh you, technically, will not be considered a homeschooler (on paper) though you will still be teaching your children at home. The level of autonomy you want in teaching your children with these programs is up to you. The programs offer a lot of flexibility. I will explain more about that in a minute. But, Understand that when you enroll in these programs, you are also enrolling your child in a “public” school. You will not, in actuality, be sending your child to a brick and mortar public school, nor will you be receiving any instruction of any sort from the teachers affiliated with that public school. Your contact will only be with representatives, mentors and/or teachers at Harmony or Mytechhigh.
How do these two programs work?
They are both very similar. In a nutshell, you report on what you’re doing for school each week and in return, they pay as much as $2,000 per student for your school supplies (books, paper, pencils, printer, ink, internet, laptop), field trips, zoo passes, extra curricular classes (like gymnastics, music, or art) and more.
They provide free learning resources like BrainPop, Reading Eggs, Mystery Science and more (each program offers a different variation of resources). They also may provide discounts for field trips and other awesome perks.
Why Choose Harmonyed?
Harmonyed, for the most part, is more flexible than Mytechhigh in respect to how you purchase your materials. They will purchase all of your materials for you and have them sent to your door. New this year, you can also purchase materials and send in your receipt to be reimbursed (within your allotted budget, of course). Unlike MytechHigh, harmony does NOT require you to spend a certain budget-amount per class-subject. With virtually no compartmentalized, budgeting-scrutinization, you can pretty much get anything educational with your harmony funds, without a sweat.
If you are interested in having your child stay up to pace with state standards, Harmony is the way to go. With harmony, you will be provided with a mentor, who is available to answer any questions you may have. They will also be checking in periodically to ensure that your child is keeping up with state standards. They will help you to know what your child needs to learn if you aren’t sure. Your child will be required to enroll in 4-6 classes, depending on their age.
The Required classes are:
Math,
Language/Arts,
Science/History as well as an
Elective class.
Older students will need to enroll in 1 or 2 more electives.
For each of these subjects, you have a few options you can select from with Harmony:
Flex
Flex Direct
Portfolio. (my preferred choice…) AND
Options day
Flex and Flex Direct classes provide your child with 18-20 worksheets in each core subject (math, science/History, L/A) that they fill out and turn in for “credit” throughout the school year. These worksheets include grade appropriate content that align with state standards. With flex, you will be responsible for teaching your child what he/she needs to understand in order to successfully fill out the worksheets. With flex-Direct, your child will work with an online teacher, via weekly video lessons in each subject. You will still have up to $1700 Funding to purchase whatever educational resources you desire, within the guidelines I mentioned above.
Portfolio option, gives you a little more freedom, in my opinion. There are no worksheets. For accountability, you or your child simply report a few sentences of what he or she did each week, per subject. This can get annoying to do week after week, especially if you have multiple children reporting. But I much prefer this over battling with my child to fill out worksheets (busy work) every week. You will also need to send in a quarterly portfolio of your child’s work. Your mentor will still check in occasionally to let you know if you have any gaps in meeting state standards for your child’s grade-level. They are not super pushy, so don’t let this stress you out. As long as your child is doing consistent work in each subject area, you will most likely be up to parr, even if you aren’t necessarily keeping tabs on state standards. You will still receive your $1700 funds for this option.
Options Day: Harmony is unique from Mytechhigh in that they provide a day of optional classes you can enroll your child in. Classes can be anywhere from Ukulele, to baking, science, art, engineering, spanish and more. This is great if you would like your child to be able to socialize in an educational atmosphere without you having to be present. This option is only available in a few areas (indlucing Lehi and Heber). You will use $600 of your funds to enroll in Options Day.
Other Options: There are a few other options to pick from that will utilize a varying amount of your funds, up to about $150. These could include kits, and other outsourced online educational programs such as k-12, Aleks Math, Imagine Academy and more.
Check out this video (coming soon) to see the class-registration process, which will give you a little more insight into the available class options.
So that’s harmony in a nutshell.
Why Choose My Tech High?
If you’re looking for something professional and streamlined, with little oversight and a simple reporting system, try My Tech High. Their expectations are extremely clear. They process information quickly. Their staff is very helpful. Their online platform is very smooth. And they are 100% reliable.
While Harmony is More flexible with educational funding, MytechHigh definitely tops harmony when it comes to reporting and accountability. They only require 2 simple steps each week. First, you check off a little box, to indicate an area of study your child has worked on, then you simply write a few sentences describing anything your child has learned that week. Unlike harmony, with MTH you only have to write one (3-5 sentence) paragraph per child (this is new this year). Harmony requires you to write a few sentences PER CLASS per-child (which comes out to about 4-8 written responses per-child...plus sending in sample work each quarter). This may not be a big deal to you, but for some, saving as much time as possible is important, and even with a small difference, that time spent reporting could be a game changer for you. Homeschool Moms are already busy enough as is. Anything to cut down on time is a bonus.
When it comes to state standards, mytechhigh gives you more freedom there as well. They realize many families are aiming to customize education to their child’s unique needs and level of competency. Because they understand this, they don’t helicopter state-standards. While you won’t get a mentor at MTH to help you navigate homeschool life, you also won’t be bothered by too much oversight. At MTH, If you are simply reporting weekly, you are doing everything you need.
Note: MTH and Harmony are BOTH required to administer annual tests for your child (which you can opt out of).
At MTH, you will be required to enroll your child in 6 classes. The first class is simply the online platform where you will report weekly what your child is learning. You will also be able to access supplemental learning programs, at no extra cost to you- such as dreambox, Reading Eggs, Mystery Science, Utah Online Library and more.
The class subjects your child will be required to enroll in are as follows:
Math
Language Arts/English
Science or Social Studies (History)
Tech/Entrepreneurial Class
Elective Class
For each subject you will have 3 class options to pick from:
MyTechHigh Direct class: an online class taught by a MTH teacher. They will provide you with all the necessary material, books, kits, etc. Uses $225 of your education allowance.
3rd party class: any group available to the public (like dance, karate, choir, etc.) You will receive up to $300 education allowance to put towards this class.
Custom-Built class: you create your own class, teach what you want when you want, how you want. (You can receive up to $225 school-funds, per class) If all of your core classes (math, english, science and elective) are custom built you can combine the funds for each of these classes and spend them however you’d like. For example, If your child is enrolled in a custom-built music class and you’d like to pay for private piano lessons, you can use these combined funds, equaling $900 to pay for lessons. You also have $500 tech allowance that you can spend on virtually anything educational (as long as it’s not religious and as long as you don’t need to purchase any tech item, such as a computer), including paying for those piano lessons that cost more than $900 for the school year.
Receive up to $1,125 funding for custom-built classes.
If you have a high-schooler, Mytech High is really your only option between the two. Harmony is only available up to 9th grade. With MyTechHigh, your child has ample high school options. They can take online classes, they can dual-enroll in up to two classes at their local public school, while still taking advantage of other opportunities and classes provided at mytechhigh (this is now available for junior high students as well). They can get a high school diploma through Mytechhigh and they can even finish their school with an associates degree, if they’re feeling ambitious. One nice component about mytechhigh is that their weekly reporting stays the same, no matter what class or grade your child is enrolled in. Harmony tends to have varying requirements when it comes to reporting, depending on the course/grade your child is in. Consistency is nice, but there are also benefits to having different reporting opportunities with Harmony. It all just depends on what works best for you.
Getting Materials through MytechHigh and Harmony:
While both programs offer close to the same budget ($1600-1800) for purchasing your school materials, there are some distinct differences between how the two work. Harmony Will give you $1800 to spend on your child’s education, however, after fees are applied, you end up receiving $1700 at most per child, for the school year. Mytech High will give you between $1600-$2000 in school funds, depending on the classes you select. For kindergarten age, the funding is cut in half at about $900 per child.
Both programs provide you with two options for utilizing funds:
Reimbursement: Allows you to be reimbursed for any non-religious educational items- classes, electronics, etc.- you purchase as long as you provide a receipt. You can even purchase used items from yard-sales to save money, with a hand-written receipt. The difference between the two programs is that, while you can submit your receipts any time during the school year at mytechhigh, they have a cap on how many times you can submit receipts for reimbursement, per year. Harmony will allow you to submit receipts once each month throughout the entire school year. This option is new at harmony, which makes their already flexible funding process even more flexible.
Wish-List: Both programs will also purchase materials for you upfront so you don’t have to break the bank waiting to be reimbursed. You simply create a wish-list of what you want and they have everything sent to your front door. It’s important to note that mytechhigh will only purchase items for you from the following two websites: Rainbowresource.com, Amazon.com. If you have materials from other websites, or if you had classes you wanted to sign your child up for (like gymnastics or horseback riding lessons), you’ll have to eat into your pocket first and send in a receipt in order to utilize your MTH funds. Harmony, on the other hand, will allow you to add anything from just about anywhere to your wish-list (classes, materials and more) at no upfront cost to you. Harmony is a great option if your budget is tight.
Which Is Best for You?
Both Programs are excellent. I have benefited from each of them in my 7 years of homeschooling. You just need to determine which one works best for you. Here’s my personal suggestion: If your budget is tight, or if you just want more flexibility with funding, go with Harmony. If you would like limited oversight and minimal reporting requirements, go with MyTechHigh. If you’re still not sure which program to choose, honestly, you’ll be just fine with either one. But if you want to know more, come back later for future posts about Mytechhigh and Harmony. You can also check out these facebook pages to get more answers to your specific questions: MTH Unofficial Chatter group, MYTECHHIGH and HARMONYED UTAH. In the meantime, here’s a video you can check out and an amazing document (by Janean Moss Olson) you can read to gain another perspective of what's available.
You got this!
With all this information, it may seem a bit overwhelming to get started. However, I can assure you, once you’re enrolled in the program, it gets easier. It will take you a few weeks to figure out your groove, but after that, it’s really quite simple.
I hope this has been helpful for you. I’d love to hear what program you go with and why- even if it’s not Harmony or My Tech High. Please share your thoughts, resources, ideas, etc. in the comments below. By collectively sharing our thoughts we can help other parents in their homeschool journey.
Thank you!!!!
Note: Everything shared here is my perspective. I am not paid or incentivized by any of these parties nor am I officially affiliated with them in any way other than my personal experiences I’ve had with them as a homeschool parent. I simply want to help other homeschool families.
As always,
If you have any questions or concerns feel free to email me or share in the comments below. I’d love to help however I can.
Thanks for reading and GOOD LUCK planning your school year!
Signed,
Me.
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