I don't think locking children in a wearhouse and awaiting the rapture is very healthy for society...

I believe that most states have basic standards. I know that Florida and Washington state both require registration of students in the form of declarations of intent to home school. Florida and Washington also require, or at least did require, yearly standardized testing. That being said, the nature and quality of education that home schooling provides varies considerably. I have encountered many exceptional students who were home schooled, most of them were on the upper end of the bell curve. I've also encountered an occasional 'special' example on the other end of the curve. I suppose that you could characterize this as a bimodal distribution.

I have noticed that I can usually tell if someone was homeschooled by watching for subtle clues and or Encyclopedia like knowledge.

Source / credentials: Personal experience as a successful college student / TA / gainfully employed victim of homeschooling


Edit: iPotato

Fixed it for you.

One of the core tenets of the Prussian schooling model was to ignore actual intellectual capacity and achievement potential, and corral kids into "grades" or classes to reinforce the caste system/feudal norm of the peasant class so that children would not pick up the revolutionary ideas of some of the academics that led to successful revolutions in the British American colonies, as well as France.

The 6-part Prussian model focused on installing the prison-like caste system into children so that they would learn to surrender their long-term life plan to an unseen, arbitrary authority figure that nobody knows or sees, other than the face of that figure manifest in the custodian of the classroom.

Children are far more capable than what is confined to the arbitrary and non-challenging "standards" found within grade levels.  "Grade levels" is probably the most effective form of the mental prison known as public schooling.

+2 for getting "they're and their" correct in usage, BTW.

Based on how irrelevant and poorly edited that was, I'm going to assume (safely) that you were home schooled in Texas.

Are the parents willing to support their offspring for the kids entire life if the kid can't get a job and be a self-supporting member of society?

I understand what you're getting at, and I'm not even totally sure I disagree. I just think some form of standards is probably the only way to figure out if the kid is actually being taught or not.

Also, it'd help for college applications and such.

Also, as to my use of "their", and "they're".... I didn't go to public school.

Any school can only do so much with the raw material it is provided.  Address the root cause of the problem - the parent and the kid - first.  When 2 out of 3 of the inputs to the equation are broken (read parents & kids) the 3rd input (read school/teachers) isn't going to make a significant difference.

This is the only real answer.  It's not up to the government to impose their failed educational process on people who want no part of it.  Yes, that means that you can give your kid a bad education or teach them wacky shit.  It might sound like a raw deal for those kids, but if we put the government into the role of dictating what must be or cannot be taught by parents to their own children, we'll end up with a lot worse than a few nutcase families frittering away their children's education.  How could that even be enforced anyway?  Kid gets an "F," mom goes to jail?  Kid fails standardized test, family is fined into financial ruin?  

I was homeschooled as well, and have known many other homeschoolers.  Cases like the one in the OP are such remote outliers, it's like talking about registering reloading presses and only permitting government-approved loadings, because some people are idiots and Kaboom their guns.

The best way to approach standards is to not have any, and to encourage competition instead.

Competition should be at the local, district, State, National, and international levels.

Standards are limits.  Competition breeds awe....

I'm torn.

My libertarian sensibilities make me very sympathetic to the idea that it's really not the state's place to tell parents how to educate their children.

OTOH, my own extensive experience with evangelical education leaves me with the opinion it's essentially child abuse in many cases. Far too many of my childhood friends crashed and burned and I had to work really hard to dig myself out of the hole that resulted from that upbringing.

I've argued before that the right's tactic regarding education is self-defeating. By abandoning the school system you're just handing that huge lever of power to the left.

People, in general, are morons and always have been. History is one long chronicle of people finding new ways to be idiots. You really need to take that into account when criticizing the public school system. Any school is only going to be as good as the community that produces it and the primary problem I see in home schooling is that community is too small. If the parents are exceptional it works out ok, but not all parents are.

My kids public school is so superior to any of the schools I attended, public or private, there isn't any comparison. I believe it's in everyone's interest to have an educated population, but it does grate when the school sends me nasty letters for pulling my kids out for supplementary field studies and such. Both of my girls are now in the 99th percentile in all subjects tested.

Testing seems like a reasonable requirement, you should be able to teach any way you want so long as the kids are at least on par. If they're not then more requirements might be in order.

No, but oddly enough the state is willing to provide lifetime support for the failures produced by its attempts at education.

Read it.

What they did was called unschooling. It's not for everyone, and while the kids may be retarded, they will still be able to easily get work provided they have their GED's. Without a GED work gets harder to find, but society as a whole most likely won't be supporting them either way (unless the state wants to get involved).

The state isn't the only failure in the education "system" - the problem starts at home.

As the future of employment continues its downward path, and median income drops, with automation increasing, you're going to see more employers looking for:

* Multiple degrees and relevant skills for management
* People with engineering degrees who have experience
* Emerging technology skills, not necessarily degrees, namely computer modeling, drafting, systems networking, diagnostics, telemetry, automation

Universities and employers are already lighting up when they see an applicant who is clearly intelligent, and was home-schooled, versus the kids who graduated with a HSD, because they know painfully well what a HSD is worth.

There is a fundamental transformation of the business and production world happening in this generation, and automation is the key pivotal factor.

It's going to result in exported jobs coming back to the US, but performed by automated systems with a few highly trained employees designing, building, monitoring, maintaining, and repairing those systems.

Most high school curricula aren't even in the same playing field required to have these skills.

By sending kids to local high schools, many are setting them up for:

* Low skilled services professions
* Unemployment
* Teaching degrees ( to crank out more of the same failed approach)

There will be a few achievers in the margins, but the rest simply have an uphill battle (only made harder for them by public school) in the coming workplace.  We're looking at 40-50% of the current jobs being made obsolete in the next 10-15 years, mainly because of automation.

This sounds like another attack on our liberty as parents and our families.  Parents have a duty to train up their children, not the state.

Also, for those that send their kids to public schools, for the few determined ones that actually get into management positions with the emerging residential construction market, they're going to be delegating construction tasks to Spanish speakers as they build significantly smaller homes.


Population growth + increased GDP + increased federal standards on emissions + dumber kids + automated production = smaller average residential home sizes.




More and more investors will be property owners, while more and more workers will be renters, rather than indentured servants under a mortgage with the bank.  People will not be able to afford to buy like they have in the US up to this point.

No shit.

Supreme Court has already said no YES:





https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierce_v._Society_of_Sisters



ETA:  OP poll fail.



 

Can't wait till inner city kids claim they "ain't gotta do skool no mo'"

 

You realize that they DO.....have standards?   Right?  

I was homeschooled and here in Montana I had to several times take end-of-year tests to ensure I was as far along as my public school counterparts......usually I was FAR....FAR ahead of them.....

This. And it's sad.

And I don't see the need to get government involved.

yes, being able to read and write coherently in English should be mandatory, home schooled or not

 
Versus sending them to a public school sucking up taxpayer money? The problem is not with uneducated youth its that of a fucking gigantic welfare state. I've ran across a many from public education that are barely able to tie their shoes. So state standards and application don't seem to promise any better returns.

But only for white folk?

This, dealing with some ignorant people here and there is far preferable than having more government control.

everyone, if you can't do this then you flunk



 

 
Under what authority?

 

So 2A supporters won't allow freedom to homeschool.  Soon we will likely not have the freedom to do either.

The government imposition of "standards" defeats the whole idea of home education.  Most all the kids I've known from homeschooling families do much better at life and work in general than the product of government schools.  Homeschool parents will resist nonsense just as surely as gun owners.  A high percentage are gun owners and pro 2A.

ETA - OP is either dishonest or a unionized teacher

You should pass the standardized tests for gaining a diploma.

How you get there is none of the governments business.

Was the young woman home schooled?

You did not say.

I don't think anyone has to accept common core.

That is what you were referring to?

Bad parenting comes in many, many different flavors.

I'm convinced this particular issue is of such a small number of people as to be inconsequential and not require government intrusion into the thousands of other homeschooling families.

There's a significant First Amendment issue here as well.

That's actually an interesting, if unusual, approach to the policy problem. So, under your proposed model, public schools, private schools, Joe's Private Testing Service LLC, etc would offer diplomas to whoever passed a battery of standardized tests? With no regard for attendance, course completion, etc? Sounds a bit like a universalized GED.

Most of my grandkids have been home schooled.They were WAY above public schools in any category you want to name.
And they are NOT socially awkward or backward.
They were tested yearly (I think) and had to meet certain minimum standards.They ALL,always exceeded those standards by a LARGE margin.
whole lot of misinformation in this thread  ....

What have you got against rapture pie?

There are outliers (read wack jobs) in each population.

The OP does not describe education of any sort that will lead to self-supporting adults.

Were you homeschooled?

I voted yes, if they want to raise idiots let them.  We are a free country.  Their religion has to stay out of school system.  I feel sorry for the children though.  

Op did a little switcharoo on the Question.  Bad form


We as a group distrust everything the government does yet we some how trust them with our children

We as a group believe everything the government touches gets corrupted, yet we some how believe that they will not corrupt our children

We as a group speak of all we will do to those that harm our children and the lengths we will go to protect them, yet as a group willingly send our children to a place with little to no protection, and think they will be safe

We as a group fawn over any one who posts that they are expecting a little one, and talk of all the great things about being a parent, and then as soon as they are born we turn them over for someone else to raise.

We as a group talk about the need of good parenting then put down and degrade all of the ones that have decided to take 100% responsibility for our children.  all to justify in our minds our decision to give our children over for someone else to raise.

A few in this thread have posted that homeshooling is equivalent to child abuse.  I declare that willingly sending your children to government schools is willful child endangerment.


Those "parents" listed in the OP are failures, but the government has no right to intervene.

NAVYIS2 is correct, he is a monster, however he is mostly correct, in that when parents fail their children, said children should not be allowed on welfare, of course this should go for the government school children also.  it appears that NAVYIS2 and others think that a higher percentage of those on welfare are homeschooled.  I seriously doubt that, but it helps fit whatever narrative they choose to follow.

Not only am I not taking, nor have I taken any government assistance, I strongly teach my children that it is unacceptable.  I pay taxes that go to government schools, I don't get a tax break and I don't want one.  I don't want the government to have any more control then they already do.

My oldest turns 20 in a week.  he scored a 110 gt score on the ASVAB and is joining the army in 2 weeks.  he easily got a job before that, after taking some college courses, but then decided to join up.  he has not taken any assistance.  his boss hates to loose him, and his boss initially thought all homeschoolers were failures, till he was reminded that my son was homeschooled.  my son is the best employee he has, but he had the same misconceptions I see all over this thread and all over ARFCOM regarding home schooling.

but ARFCOM will be ARFCOM

I voted "yes" because I assumed the poll was asking whether there should be standards.  Bloody bait and switch.  No, you shouldn't be able to stifle your children's growth just because you're an idiot.

Yes.  We should make mandated, federal guidelines, which are written and monitored by the powers in DC, because of the extremely rare cases of crazy homeschoolers who don't teach their children.  That way, we can make sure they get the proper indoctrination education. We need more "Islam Day" and "Why Mad Made Global Warming is Real" at home, too.

Make sure we continue to legislate to the lowest common denominator, because working towards the LCD has done wonders for us, both in our school systems and our overall government.  

Well said.  

The security issue alone should make any thinking person cringe at what their kids are subjected to in the care of obese morons who know nothing about the world, let alone how to protect themselves and the kids in their daily care.

The school system in the US has been a resounding success at breeding docile servants who lack any critical thinking skills.  Just look through any of the threads here and you will see one logical fallacy after another when trying to argue a point, when they are basic and amateur fallacies at that, easily recognized in a 101 course.

This thread and the OP show several examples of fallacies, bait and switch thread title and poll, and how easily many fell into the trap.  Then we have a cherry-picked scenario that we don't know the veracity of, used to represent the broader population of home schoolers, another fallacy argument geared towards supporting more government intrusion into the private lives of families.

Stop with facts and critical thinking...that is the kind of shit homeschoolers subject their children to.

No way dude!

Any effort toward "standards" is part of the communist plot which is destroying the moral fabric of this nation.