The Alexandria Learning Cooperative wants to expand into a full-time private school and move operations to Fairlington United Methodist Church.
The school has submitted a special use permit application to transition from a homeschool cooperative into a full-time private school for up to 75 students. The move means renting out three classrooms at Fairlington UMC and expanding its current two-day-a-week program to allow for full-time Montessori-inspired classes for kids ages 5 to 9, where students learn at their own pace in mixed-age classes.
Former Fairfax County Public Schools teacher Lindsay Willman, who founded Alexandria Learning Cooperative in 2023, said that her programming needs have quickly changed over the last two-plus years. The school currently rents out one classroom at Fairlington UMC and shares the building with Fairlington Preschool.
“If you’ve talked to other small businesses and nonprofits, it’s really hard to find affordable space,” Willman said. “Churches are [a] really wonderful partner. Next [school] year, we’ll have a couple classrooms, and we’re becoming a full-time private school to try to accommodate more families, not just homeschool families. But we still will have those homeschool kids that come just for their enrichment once or twice a week, which will be really nice, and so we’ll have the space to do both.”
The school provides Montessori-inspired academics and teaches music, art, movement and Spanish. Students go on monthly field trips, and Willman said that regardless of the expansion, they will continue spending a lot of time learning every fall and spring at the Arcadia Center for Sustainable Food and Agriculture near Fort Belvoir.
“We expect up to 75 students between the hours of 8:30 a.m. and 2:40 p.m. (at times we may stay later for special programming that would end by 4 p.m.),” the school said in its application. “We expect up to 25 staff members total with only 10-12 staff members on-site at the same time. They would typically be present from 8:15 to 3:30.”
Willman said that there are 20 kids currently in the school and expects to have 40 to start the next school year. It will eventually expand to allow kids up to the age of 13.
“We don’t want to get want to get too big, because I feel like that would change our community and how we operate,” she said. “We probably will stay in that micro-school territory.”
The last day for public comments on the plan is March 5.
