Outschool is an approved vendor for many charter schools, enabling their families to purchase Outschool classes with their charter funds. Note that classes often sell out quickly, so we recommend giving your school an alternative class time as a backup option when submitting requests to your school, as Outschool cannot guarantee there will be available spaces in your preferred time.
There are two ways that charter schools enroll learners in Outschool classes, via Purchase Orders (POs) or via Charter Admin Accounts. See below for specifics on ongoing classes, which differ for both methods.
Enrolling in Classes
If your charter school has approved Outschool as a vendor, then it’s easy to apply your school funds to our classes. Here are the processes under the 2 methods used by charter schools:
Enrolling via Purchase Order
Find the class you’d like to register your learner in on Outschool.com
Then reach out to your Education Specialist (ES)/Homeschool Teacher (HST) or the person who handles charter fund purchases at your school. Provide them with the full name of the class, the section you would like to sign up for, a link to the class page, the email associated with your Outschool account, as well as your learner’s name and age.
Your ES/HST will decide whether or not to approve the purchase and will complete any other necessary steps on their end.
Your school will send a purchase order to Outschool. Please note that the time between steps 2 and 4 varies from school to school and can take as long as a few weeks.
Outschool will process the purchase order within 1-2 business days of receiving it from your school. We will enroll you in the requested class and send the standard class enrollment confirmation email once we have done so.
Enrolling via Charter Admin Account
Find the class you’d like to register your learner in on Outschool.com
Reach out to your Education Specialist (ES)/Homeschool Teacher (HST) or the person who handles charter fund purchases at your school. Provide them with the full name of the class, the section you would like to sign up for, a link to the class page, the email associated with your Outschool account, as well as your learner’s name and age.
Your ES/HST will decide whether or not to approve the purchase
Your school’s ordering department will process the class via credit card purchase using their Charter Admin Account.
Please note that the time between steps 2 and 4 varies from school to school and can take as long as a few weeks.
Once your school processes the order, you will receive the standard class enrollment confirmation email from Outschool.
After step 2 in both processes, there’s no need for additional action on your part to enroll in courses.
Outschool receives a high volume of purchase orders each day. Please only reach out to us about the status of your enrollment if your class is coming up in the next three days.
Reserving a place in a class
Occasionally families choose to pay for a spot in a class prior to placing an order with their charter in an effort to “hold” their spot. Please note that if your school does not approve an order for a class where you have done this, the card holder will be responsible for this payment. Refunds are only guaranteed if you withdraw from the class within the refund window. Please note that you cannot reserve a spot via credit card for Ongoing classes.
Please check with your specific charter school to make sure reserving a spot in class via credit card works with their process, as not all Charter schools allow for this method of holding a spot.
Ongoing classes
Families are able to request an Ongoing Class in up to 18 consecutive-week increments from their charter school.
Once the requested amount of class weeks from the order have been completed, the learner will be withdrawn on the day that the last class ends. Outschool Support can then re-enroll the learner for additional weeks if we have another PO authorizing us to do so or if the charter places an additional order using their Charter Admin account. Alternatively, the family can resubscribe to the class subscription with their own funds by going to Transactions -> View Class Page under the class title, then clicking “resume subscription.”
Please note, some homeschool charters have different regulations about how many weeks can be booked at a time. Please check with your charter administrators to confirm the number of weeks you can request before placing your order with them.
Enrolling in Fixed-Length classes
Charter families can either request to purchase the entire class upfront or can bulk enroll for anywhere between 4 weeks and 18 weeks of class. Simply let your charter know how many weeks you’d like to enroll for between 4 and 18 weeks and they/we will take care of the rest.
Once enrollment ends, enroll again for additional weeks to continue your learner’s class participation.
Enrolling in 1:1 Tutoring under the new format
Outschool rolled out a new tutoring format in the fall of 2023. As of November 2023, charter families are able to register for the new 1:1 format.
Tutoring Classes with the new format will indicate availability, showing dates and times available in a calendar view similar to this:
Once you have selected a day and time that you would like tutoring to take place, please follow the instructions below:
Reach out to your Education Specialist (ES)/Homeschool Teacher (HST) or the person who handles charter fund purchases at your school. Provide them with the following:
Full name of the tutoring class
The day and time you’d like to register for
How many weeks you’d like to book (this can be up to 12 weeks, however every Charter varies in how many weeks they allow, so please confirm your school’s policy before placing your order)
A link to the class listing
The email associated with your Outschool account
Your learner’s name and age
Your ES/HST will decide whether or not to approve the purchase.
Your school’s ordering department will process via whichever method they use (Purchase Order or Charter Admin - see above for further details.)
Should any of the weeks you requested not be available at the time of enrollment, your charter will be notified and you will not be charged for those weeks.
Once the order is processed, you will receive the standard class enrollment confirmation email from Outschool.
A note regarding processing times: Given the delay from the time you place your order with your Charter School to the time it’s processed, please give your Charter 1-2 back up times that you are available. Please note that private section links for the new 1:1 format expire 7 days after the link was created, after which time the time slot is released to the general public. As a result, if your order request uses a private section link to help hold the spot, please still include 1-2 alternative times on your order request.
A note regarding requesting tutoring sessions for more than 1 day a week: At this time, should you desire to hold tutoring sessions more than once a week, you will need to place two separate orders for the individual days a week you’d like to meet.
Approved Vendor Programs
Outschool is a pre-approved vendor for over 50 charter schools in California, Alaska, Arizona, Wisconsin, and Canada. If you'd like to register for Outschool classes, ask your charter school to partner with us. Please have them reach out to schoolsupport@outschool.com and we will start the process to become an approved vendor with your school.
Can I use my Charter School funds to purchase an Outschool Membership Plan?
No, charter school funds cannot be used directly to purchase an Outschool Membership. However, families can buy a membership using a personal credit card.
How do Charter purchases affect membership usage?
Classes purchased through charter schools are processed separately and are not deducted from an Outschool Membership balance.
Only classes purchased directly from a parent’s Outschool account will count toward membership usage.
Any classes ordered via your charter school will be paid for using charter funds and will not be applied toward membership credits.
Will my charter school reimburse charges for an Outschool membership?
If you’re seeking reimbursement for your membership through a charter school, we recommend contacting your charter school directly to confirm eligibility and understand the reimbursement process.