Tag: testimonial

Jane Smith: “I am haunted by the question of what might have been different”

“Homeschooling students who, like me, are privileged to have the skills necessary to fill in the gaps in our education can often bounce back from sub-standard educations. But others, like my brothers, who lack these skills will forever pay the price. The costs of the lack of oversight are borne by the most vulnerable.”

Cynthia Jeub: “I wasn’t really taught anything after I was ten years old”

“In the state of Colorado, homeschooled students are required to take placement tests every couple of years. There’s an exemption for parents who are certified teachers. My dad had a bachelor’s degree in English, and had taught it briefly, so we never took any tests.”

Sierra S.: “My mom … was obviously overwhelmed”

“If there had been more oversight, my mom may have been able to get more motivated to get organized and give me and my sisters the education we needed. My sisters and I would not be in the very difficult place we are right now because of being under educated.”

Alisa Harris: “Even growing up, I knew I was one of the lucky homeschoolers”

“Even growing up, I knew I was one of the lucky homeschoolers. My family knew homeschooled children who worked in the family businesses instead of doing school, kids who could barely read and who had learning disabilities that their families were not equipped to even identify, let alone address. . . . In so many of these cases, the physical, educational, and emotional neglect was never confronted, not even by fellow homeschooling parents, the only people in a position to see it.”

Elizabeth W.: “I am a survivor”

“My mother informed me that from now on we were all going to be “homeschooled” so that no more nosy teachers would be interfering in “our” (her) lives. One of my youngest stepsiblings had made some mention to a teacher of the rampant domestic violence that routinely rampaged through our home. . . . Homeschooling was the first step my mom took to make sure no one could get involved through children’s loose tongues ever again.”

Giselle Palmer: “Good home schools will show progress”

“In a country where education is compulsory and all schools and teachers face extreme levels of accountability for their teaching, home schools (while having some degree of curricular freedom) should also demonstrate that they are, in fact, educating children. If parents are providing sufficient education for their kids, this should not be a frightening prospect.”

Holly S.: “If there had only been some protection in place”

“Many of my friends and I do not have high school diplomas or transcripts. In the states in which we were homeschooled, there was little oversight and no requirement that parents provide such documents to graduating home school students. In addition to the rampant educational neglect that occurred in homeschool circles, the lack of proper documents made it difficult for many of us to access higher education.”

Ryan Stollar: “Not everyone had parents like I did”

“That moment made me realize that, while my parents were highly invested in us jumping through all the hoops to make sure we succeeded, not all parents are like that. Not all homeschool parents know how to educate their children — let alone educate them well. Not all homeschool parents care about the quality of their children’s education. Even the parents that co-existed with mine, that went to all the same meetings and conventions that mine did.”

Kieryn Darkwater: “It’s so easy for people like me … to fall through the cracks”

“If my parents had been unable to write off the validity and necessity of subjects based on theology or gender, if it had been harder for my parents to circumvent the rules, if I had been required to have an evaluation done by a teacher unrelated to my family, I think I would have had a better chance at a decent and well rounded education.”

Kathryn Brightbill: “I’ve seen how wonderful homeschooling can be”

“I support oversight of home education not because I had a bad homeschooling experience, but because I had a good one. I’ve seen how wonderful homeschooling can be when it works because I’ve lived it. When I hear the stories of homeschooled students who experienced educational neglect or abuse, or the formerly homeschooled adults who are struggling to overcome the deficits in their education, it saddens me to know how much the system failed them.”

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