Home-Schooled Kids Speak Out

A few days ago, the cable network Al Jazeera America reactivated a dormant Twitter hashtag #homeschoolkid with this question: Should home schooling be regulated more?  There was also a link to this article on their website. Responses have been pouring in, and I thought we’d share a sample here for those of you who don’t do the Twitter thing.

• As someone who was (very successfully) homeschooled for 12 years, yes.
• Homeschooling was one of the best choices my parents made for me as a child. I was given freedom to learn – & I went for it.
• H-schooling saved me from gender stereotypes (girls=bad at math). I delved into my interests w/o being pushed down by society.
• We w/subjected to state tests yearly, and my family always ranked higher than school district.Here’s to not following curriculum.
• Homeschooling allowed me lots of of time at home alone reading encyclopedias

Somewhere along the thread however, you notice a shift in response that is perhaps less Al Jazeera’s regular audience, and more from people in the Christian stream of home-schooling:

• Pro – I became a great speller Con – I grew up believing Robert E Lee was just doing his Christian duty.
• Maybe the bigger issue with homeschooling is this ‘divine right of parents’ thing that seems to have no boundaries.
• I think homeschooling can be done well, but someone has to look out for the kids who aren’t getting the education they need.
• Homeschooling should not be an altar raised for the gods of parental rights on which children’s rights are daily sacrificed.
• I’m disgusted that my parents belonged to HSLDA, a group that called a man who forced his kids to live in cages a “hero”
• I was raised with ACE, a curriculum that until recently, claimed that the Loch Ness Monster actually existed. Seriously.
• As a #homeschoolkid I knew a few of homeschoolers who stopped school after middle school. The homeschool community did nothing about it.
• My white mother and black father taught me history from Bob Jones [curriculum]
• It’s always sad to hear people say my time as a #homeschoolkid “sounds like a lot of fun!” – it really wasn’t. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.
• I’m fond of telling people that I was Valedictorian, class clown, prom queen, and most likely to get pregnant.
• …new responses still being added…