Some notes on the new Georgia Aquarium:

Homeschool friendly?

Did you all notice that they consider homeschoolers as a part of 'school groups' that can get in for $9.50??? If you read carefully on the website it clearly says that. The only hitch I can see is you have to have a minimum of 15 students so that lets out most individual families.

Nope:

I went to look at the educator options for the Aquarium and realized that this $9.50 option ONLY gets you on the 2nd floor educational wing for the educational part. They trick you and tell the kids to come back to see the whole aquarium with their families. It is specific that this admission is not for any other parts of the aquarium.

Here is one homeschooling family's letter to the aquarium:

I just wanted to offer my opinion on the admission prices for the Georgia Aquarium. There are many things available to spend our money on, but as a homeschooling family living on one income, we will probably choose an annual pass for the Tennessee aquarium rather than spending over twice as much for the Georgia pass.

I hope you will adjust your pricing in the future to make the aquarium more family friendly.

This is the response this family received:

From: "Guest Services"
Date: 2005/11/01 Tue PM 01:54:25 EST
Subject: RE: family annual pass

Have a wonderful trip to Tennessee then. But, here's something to consider. We're 9 times the size of the TN aquarium. We have about 8 times as many fish as they do and five times the square footage.

We are also a non profit and all of our extra money goes back into research on our animals and towards the education of your children. If you homeschool, have you looked into our education program? Probably not since it sounds like you're assuming we're the same kind of aquarium as TN. Oh, and don't forget about those little whale sharks we have that can't be seen anywhere but japan and the Beluga whales that we're rehabilitating. Is that worth the extra money? In my opinion - yes

paul

As for me and my family, we'll return to TN when we want to see a quality, high-value, homeschool-friendly aquarium. I have no desire to spend my hard-earned money on a place that treats its potential patrons as noted above.