We had the good fortune of connecting with Dominque Burgess and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Dominque, putting aside the decision to work for yourself, what other decisions were critical to your success?
The most important decision I made that contributed to my success was homeschooling my two boys. I grew to love homeschooling and the opportunity to differentiate the learning experience for my boys by testing out different techniques I wanted to share through my business. For example, I love integrating hands on projects into our homeschooling schedule and each time I try a new project or activity with my boys I am able to share it with my audience of customers as things they can implement as homeschooling families as well as advertise it as things teachers at my learning academy will integrate into our curriculum.

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
I am honored to be living my dream as an everyday reality. I founded Burbrella LLC as an umbrella organization that combines my love, passion and dedication to education. We currently have an online learning academy where we provide homeschooling instruction for homeschooling families of preschool to high schoolers. What set’s Burbrella Learning Academy apart from others is our approach to learning. We aren’t trying to mimic traditional online schools, our classes are only 50′ minutes and our teachers focus on the needs of each child through our non traditional schedule. We also provide support for the whole family in the form of video resources, curriculum files and much more. Our goal is to provide education for all not just children. Honestly, I got where I am today because of the pandemic. While this was a difficult time for many families, I felt like I wanted to use my passion for education to do more. The pandemic allowed me to see that it’s okay to step out of the norm for change to happen in a successful way as it relates to education. Many children started to flourish during remote learning and I knew families needed more opportunities for this to happen for their children to stay motivated. It wasn’t easy saying hey your child can learn in a non traditional setting that is your home or a park and people actually listen. But I was able to share my homeschooling journey while launching the academy and I think that showed other families that it’s possible!

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Well, first we would visit our two Burbrella Homeschool Co-ops that serves the Metro Atlanta area . We have a co-op for Autistic children in elementary to middle school where they actually get to engage in field trips and sensory based learning opportunities designed specifically for them. We would visit our second co-op and engage any of their social events from parties to homeschool graduations etc. During the week we would definitely visit OLG to grab some amazing food and shop at all the trendy places to add to our business fashion wardrobe. Lastly, we would have to visit the aquarium thats just a must each time I visit.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
My shoutout goes to one of my biggest supporters and mentors Ms. Jolli Brown. She has always believed in my non traditional approaches and ideas in education when no one else did. I remember in college during my second year I launched the first education club on campus, and I wanted to throw a fashion show. Her first words to me was how can we tie this back to the education club to get it approved. I didn’t have an answer at that time but we was able to take the proceeds we earned that night and donate to children in an underserved community who lost their mom right outside their school building as she was shielding them from gun violence. Ms. Brown has never turned down any of my ideas but always gave me a motive to keep pushing and tons of resources to make it happen. I don’t know where me or my ideas would be without her; she is the reason I am always motivated to do more in Burbrella.

Website: www.burbrella.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yafavteacher28/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dominque-burgess-946937bb/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Yafavteacher28

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100004372244960

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCHZ4q0kOHYVOSl99kSshWA

Image Credits
Images from Burbrella LLC 2022

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