Educate

If you already have a class planned and know how to add it to our calendar, click here. We’re also looking for teachers for these topics. Can you teach any? If so read on and create your class!

Organize the class

To start a class, please pick a topic and decide how many sessions you would like this class to be. You also may elect to teach a workshop series of related but stand-alone classes. After you know what you would like to teach and how many classes there will be in your topic, choose a location. Click here if you need help finding a location. You will also need to know when you would like to offer your class. For a workshop, we suggest Saturday or Sunday. For a weekly course, we suggest an evening during the week. Consider your audience; mornings and afternoons might work well for some students.

Some things to consider are:

• Is your class already being taught? If so, would your knowledge help provide a more complete course?
  • Attend the class or contact the current teacher to see if the material overlaps
  • If you would like to expand on the current class, plan this with the current teacher. Some options:
    • Teach together
    • Teach your class directly after the existing class for a longer, more in-depth course
    • Extend the class for more weeks to cover more material
    • Teach on a different day so more people have access to the information
• What background should students have in the class topic? Can newbies understand your lessons or should students have a basic understanding of some subjects prior to attending your class?
• What materials do students need?
  • Should students bring anything?
  • Can you provide necessary materials?
    • Have students RSVP and bring money to cover the costs of the materials
    • Provide electronic copies of materials to students who have signed up for the course
• Do you need any resources from Boulder Free School
  • Have you found a location?
  • Are enough students attending your course?
  • Would you like volunteers to help in the classroom or to help advertise?

Add the class to the calendar

If you are ready to add your class to the calendar, you can create your own event on a google calendar and add boulderfreeschool@gmail.com to the guest list. This will automatically add your event to the free school calendar. The paragraph below describes how to do this in detail. If you do not have a google calendar or would rather us put it on the calendar, email us.

If you have a google calendar, add boulderfreeschool@gmail.com to your event (please don’t send the invitation) by typing our email address into the box under “Add guests” on the right side of the page. You can decide whether we can edit the event or not by clicking the appropriate check box below.

To get started go to www.google.com/calendar. Afterward you can double-check that it’s on our calendar on our website.

These are things you are asked to include:

• a brief bio
• what subject you will teach
• a description for the website and detailed calendar (see classes or workshops)
  • include a list of suggested materials (if any) and material costs
  • be concise yet descriptive (write what prospective students should know)
• when you will teach
  • day(s) of the week
  • time(s) of the day
  • frequency (once, weekly, monthly, etc.)
• where you will teach
  • It is crucial that you have permission to use the space for your purpose. See script below for help acquiring permission
  • with permission, your location will be added to the list of locations on our website

Script for asking someone else if you can use their space

Hi, my name is Robin Hood and I enjoy archery. I am hoping to start teaching archery classes through Boulder Free School, a school that puts free classes on a public calendar so that anyone can go to the classes and learn what the teachers are teaching. I think class sizes will be about 5-10 people. I’m hoping to do a weekly class for about 3 months. I would like to hold these 90-minute classes on CU’s Business Field because it is a good size and is in a central location. If CU agrees to host this class on the Business Field, it will be listed as a location on the Boulder Free School website, https://boulderfreeschool.wordpress.com. This is a great opportunity to be involved in the community and to extend CU’s educational efforts beyond those who can afford higher education. Are you willing to host this class, and if so what day and time slots are available to use this space? My thoughts are Tuesdays from 1:30 – 3:00 PM, beginning May 21^st and ending August 6^th, but any day of the week between 10 AM and 7 PM will work fine.

Thank you,

Robin Hood

Advertise

There are plenty of ways to advertise! If we know about your class, it will be put on our calendar and our email list. To get more students, you can:

• Talk to friends and strangers
• Make and distribute fliers
• Make and distribute posters
• Do class raps
• Chalk
• USE SOCIAL MEDIA

Pearl Street, CU, Naropa and the hill are great places to flier, poster and meet people to talk to about your classes. You can ask stores if you can leave fliers with them, and you can ask teachers if you can pass them out during their classes. Teachers also might let you do class raps – talk for a minute or so at the beginning of the class. Advertising posts for posters are available on Pearl Street and at CU. There is one to the northwest of the UMC on the walkway between Hellems and Ekeley. There might be others. Bulletin boards and bathroom stalls are also great places to advertise your class. You can also chalk, on the ground or blackboards. Definitely coordinate with other Free School teachers who teach something that might attract the same students as your class so that you can mention each other’s class during your own. Remember to ask if you’d like help advertising. Click here for a great advertising tool (create an “event” and post to this site)