In the fall of 2021, mask mandates were still in place in her local district schools, and the Montessori school that her younger children attended grew stricter with its mask policy, so Perez decided to homeschool all of her children and turn her learning pod into an established schooling alternative. She founded Tranquil Teachings, a learning center in Monmouth County, New Jersey that operates on a private membership model where parents can choose to send their children part-time or full-time each week to engage in academic and/or enrichment activities. She currently has 40 students enrolled.
“The fact that we were fearing people was also very problematic to me,” said Perez of her decision to launch Tranquil Teachings. “The schools were encouraging our children to keep six feet apart and to not be near someone while they were having lunch. That was so contrary to the message that I felt as a parent I wanted to share with my own kids,” she said. Bringing people together was a key catalyst for Perez in building the Tranquil Teachings community.
This sense of community-building with like-minded people was what prompted Stacy Joyce to enroll her eight-year-old son, Dash, part-time at Tranquil Teachings. When the schools shut down in the spring of 2020 and switched to remote learning, Dash voiced how much he hated school. In response, his parents un-enrolled him from the local school and embraced homeschooling instead. “We wanted to provide the most normal environment possible. We go about our lives, we don’t have our child wear a mask unless in a medical office,” said Joyce.
Dash spent much of last year in homeschooling-related enrichment activities that were held outside, in addition to working on his home-based academic curriculum. “It was great to be outside all day, but sometimes it’s cold and I don’t want to spend the day out in the woods,” said Joyce, who works as a yoga instructor. “I really appreciate that Jill has been able to create this community. The more we stay away from school, the less and less that seems like an option to return to,” she added.
Perez has also been able to create a community for teachers who no longer want to comply with their schools’ COVID policies in the greater New York and New Jersey area. “These are our thinking teachers,” said Perez. “I was able to take some of these teachers and bring them here and they’re wonderful. They have a lot of skills, they’re questioning things. And they are loving what they are doing in a way that they haven’t in years,” she said.
As an education entrepreneur, Perez encourages other parents and educators to use this transformational moment to create new learning communities. “Get out of your comfort zone,” she suggests. “Understand that connection is our way out of this. It’s the opposite of everything we’ve been told,” she adds.