There was a time when I thought homeschooling was generally inferior to public or private schools. I changed my mind in the early 1990′s when gangs started appearing in high schools where I lived at the time.
I don’t have any children yet, but the security problems alone at public schools would prevent me from sending my kids. My wife and I are planning to start a family this year and we’ve already decided to go with homeschooling and private schools. I would never live in California but if my state of Texas passed a law banning homeschooling, I would simply not obey. I would fight them in various courts and by the time they got through my attorneys, my kids would have graduated college and it would be a moot point.
Parents have many reasons for homeschooling their children and the state has no business legislating what parents may or may not do in their homes.
Here’s a hypothetical concerning the so-called YouTube attack in Florida last month:
A 16-year old girl, an honor roll student and varsity cheerleader was savagely beaten by 8 fellow students just so they could get some video of the beating to post on YouTube. Her parents have announced that she will be homeschooled for the remainder of her high school career.
If they lived in California, would her parents be criminals for homeschooling their daughter? Would they actually compound the injustice of her attack with another injustice of going after her parents?
Any CA state legislators and education officials who support the homeschooling ban should be made to attend public school classes in South Central Los Angeles for one week. I’m quite sure that experience would change their minds, if they made it back home in one piece.
The security situation alone is compelling enough to drive parents toward homeschooling. There are many other compelling reasons for parents to shun public schools. Parents need to have every available educational option open to them because the government at all levels is failing badly when it comes to educating our kids. Having that same government take away options is just plain wrong, and it reeks of socialism. As usual, it’s up to voters to elect responsible leaders instead of socialist morons.
