There's Been a Major Change in Attitude at the Department of Education

Each day, it seems like we learn a little more about the new Donald Trump administration. On Friday, Trump's Department of Education made it appear as if it might embrace homeschooling. If so, this is a huge change from the Joe Biden administration, which was downright hostile toward any type of education that didn't involve placing children in public school classrooms and indoctrinating them.

Trump's Education Department has a new blog on its website, and the very first post, which was published on Friday, is called "Homeschooling: The Lifeline We Didn’t Know We Needed." It's written by Stephanie D. Birch, a mother of two and homeschool advocate.

It starts by recognizing that every child is unique and learns in different ways at different speeds, a concept that's seemingly been lost in this country for a while:

I remember how shocked I was when my three-year-old began reading. I quickly realized the educational pathway we planned would not meet her needs. I saw in her eyes that she had unlocked the magic of reading, and I knew the prescribed educational path would stifle her, leaving her mind yearning for more.
We set out on an empowering journey that led us to homeschooling – the lifeline we didn’t know we needed. It gave us the space and flexibility to craft an education as unique as our children, nurturing their hearts and minds, and giving them the chance to grow into their best selves.

Birch goes on to explain that she once fell for the stereotypes about homeschooling herself but that, upon embracing it, it her family saw changes she couldn't imagine:

I once believed in stereotypical misconceptions about homeschooling: Children lacking socialization, overly sheltered, and stuck completing worksheets. The truth is, homeschooling allows my children to learn, grow and blossom at a pace tailored to their rhythm for each individual area of study. For the kids who are neurodivergent, creative, or otherwise don’t fit the “traditional” mold, homeschooling allows them to shine. We’ve witnessed our kids thrive in things like STEM, art, robotics, fencing, martial arts, dance, and traveling to new places where they can immerse themselves in different cultures and histories in ways textbooks alone could never teach.

I will point out that the fine print on the Education Department's blog says, "Blog articles provide insights on the activities of schools, programs, grantees, and other education stakeholders to promote continuing discussion of educational innovation and reform. Articles do not endorse any educational product, service, curriculum or pedagogy." But if the first post is about homeschooling, I'm going to go out on a limb and say we're heading in the right direction.

Of course, this comes just a few days after Trump signed the "Expanding Educational Freedom and Opportunity for Families" executive order, which promotes school choice and supports putting decisions about education back into the hands of a child's family, regardless of their geographic location or socioeconomic status. And it's a complete 180 from the last administration, which wanted to have total government control over, well, just about everything, but especially education.

In an article entitled "Biden Wants Schools That Please Politicians, Not Parents," Reason magazine points out that Biden repeatedly dismissed any form of school choice on the campaign trail back in 2020, stating that it would hurt the "entire public education system." Yes, because the system is far more important than the people in it...

In 2021, Biden's secretary of education, Michael Cardona, was asked by the Senate Education Committee if parents should be in charge of their children's schooling. He replied, "I believe parents are important stakeholders, but I also believe educators have a role in determining educational programming."

That same year, the Washington Post itself, the most liberal of newspapers, published an opinion piece that asked, "Why are unions and Democrats so opposed to giving poor children a choice in schooling?"

Also in 2021, a Harvard law professor, Elizabeth Bartholet, published an article on homeschooling "and the threat it poses to children and society." In it, she called for the government to implement a "presumptive ban" on this type of education.

The Washington Times even compared the Biden administration's attitudes toward parental involvement in their children's education to Communism. And rightfully so:

Now, in the face of Attorney General Merrick Garland’s directive to FBI agents and U.S. attorney officials to start investigating parents who protest school board members too loudly as possibly guilty of committing acts of 'domestic terrorism' — at the bidding of the National Schools Boards Association — it seems the Democratic Party has come out of hiding and tipped its hand completely on leftist plans for America’s youngest and most vulnerable: to steal them from parental control to indoctrinate them in socialist-slash-communist-slash-Marxist ideology.
It’s how Cuba does their kids.
It’s how all the commie countries do their kids.
You think parents in communist countries have an inherent, God-given right to control the teachings of their children?

What a sobering reminder of how lucky we are that the Democrats didn't prevail in 2024.