Un-Scientific American wants homeschool regulated

Check this out!

My friend and fellow education freedom-fighter, Corey DeAngelis keyed me in to a recent article over at Scientific American.

They’ve titled it, Children Deserve Uniform Standards in Homeschooling, and, as you might guess, it had a few things to say about the alleged perils of homeschooling.

I have to admit that I’ve developed a serious skepticism toward anything that holds itself up as “the science” in any way, and Scientific American isn’t doing much to help me overcome it. 

Anyway, let’s break down some of their claims and see how they hold up under scrutiny.

“Scientific” https://t.co/VACexMI6S9

— Connor Boyack 📚 (@cboyack) June 18, 2024

First, the article starts with a rather dramatic concern: that homeschooling is barely tracked or regulated in the U.S., and thus an untold number of children are at risk of poor education or even abuse.

Let’s put on our critical thinking caps here.

The homeschooling movement has grown significantly, especially post-COVID, but the idea that lack of stringent regulations equals rampant educational neglect or abuse is not only alarmist, but also simply untrue.

Homeschooling has produced 4 National Spelling Bee champions and some of the most brilliant minds across a wide range of fields.

Remember Laura Ingalls Wilder, the beloved author of the Little House series? Homeschooler.

How about Thomas Edison? Yep, he was homeschooled too.

Did you know that Blaise Pascal, the mathematical genius and inventor of the mechanical calculator, was also homeschooled? Or that Tim Tebow, the Heisman Trophy winner and former NFL quarterback, was educated at home?

What about U.S. Presidents? Well, there’s George Washington, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States.

But wait! There’s more!

John Adams, John Quincy Adams, James Garfield, Andrew Jackson, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, James Polk, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Theodore Roosevelt—all homeschooled.

Huh.. it’s almost like parents are the most qualified of anyone to recognize their kids individual needs, skills, and abilities, and help them achieve their best possible life.

These success stories are often glossed over or mentioned as anomalies, but they are more common than you might think.

The article acknowledges this but then quickly pivots to scare tactics about potential abuse.

Of course any instance of child abuse is tragic and unacceptable, but to suggest that homeschooling inherently facilitates abuse is misleading.

They would like us to believe that public schooling environments are inherently safer simply because they are regulated. But that is an outright lie. 

Public schools have a documented epidemic of teacher abuse that has, for decades, seen dangerous men and women given unfettered access to their victims with little to no consequence if their victims come forward. 

Someone could probably make a pretty solid argument that public schools are actually designed to hide or even facilitate abuse rather than to protect against it. 

The claim that homeschoolers fare worse academically or that studies showing positive outcomes are biased and methodologically flawed is another lie.

The National Home Education Research Institute has plenty of data showing that homeschoolers commonly outperform their public school counterparts on standardized tests and in college performance.

What this article doesn’t seem to address (shocker!) is the underlying agenda. 

There is a persistent narrative that education should be under the strict control of the state—that the state should decide what children learn, and how they learn it.

Of course, along the way they take the liberty of teaching our kids what morals and values they should adopt as their own. Values that are increasingly out of sync with what parents believe. 

And when parents make a fuss about it, they simply ban schools from being able to set policies that allow parents to know what is happening in the classroom. 

Many parents choose homeschooling precisely because they want to avoid the pitfalls of public schooling, whether it’s the lack of individualized attention, the one-size-fits-all curriculum, or the state-sponsored ideological indoctrination that comes with it.

The Tuttle Twins and the Education Vacation tells the story of how Ethan and Emily left public school to begin their homeschool journey (and why!).

It’s a great way to introduce kids to the idea of homeschool, and I’ve heard from a lot of parents that it’s really helped their homeschooled kids see their life through a newly appreciative lens.

In the end, parents are simply the best judges of what their children need. 

The diversity of approaches within homeschooling is a strength, not a weakness. While we should always strive to protect children, blanket regulations and fear-mongering are not the answers.

Parents should always retain the freedom to choose the best educational path for their kids, whether that’s homeschooling, private school, public school, or some variation.

Whatever education in your family looks like, I think we can all agree that less government in the mix is the right answer. 

We’ve got an entire website full of resources for parents to teach their kids why the state is simply never the answer. Our books and curricula teach why free market principles, sound money, and personal responsibility are the proven methods for achieving the greatest degree of human prosperity and peace.

Check them out today, and if you’re already a fan, share your love for our work with a friend or family member!

Those who would like to see our rights to our own children limited and twisted up in government red tape are evangelical in spreading their message and fighting for their cause. 

We must be too. 

Join me in this fight! We have what it takes to win.

— Connor

P.S. Did you know that Corey and I wrote a book together?

It shares forty examples of how poorly today’s government schools are doing and how the “rising tide of mediocrity” that the National Commission on Excellence in Education warned us about in 1983 has created a tsunami of low expectations and poor performance. 

Aptly titled, Mediocrity, you can read a sample of it here!