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Why Home School?

Mike

Well-known member
Walter Williams: Why Home Schooling?
Creators Syndicate | September 2, 2015 | Walter E. Williams


Many public primary and secondary schools are dangerous places. The Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics and the Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics show that in 2012, there were about 749,200 violent assaults on students. In the 2011-12 academic year, there were a record 209,800 primary- and secondary-school teachers who reported being physically attacked by a student. Nationally, an average of 1,175 teachers and staff were physically attacked, including being knocked out, each day of that school year. In Baltimore, each school day in 2010, an average of four teachers and staff were assaulted. Each year, roughly 10 percent of primary- and secondary-school teachers are threatened with bodily harm.

Many public schools not only are dangerous but produce poor educational results. According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress for 2013, sometimes called the Nation's Report Card (http://tinyurl.com/mn6snpf), only 33 percent of white 12th-graders tested proficient in math, and 47 percent tested proficient in reading. For black 12th-graders, it was a true tragedy, with only 7 percent testing proficient in math and 16 percent in reading. These grossly disappointing educational results exist despite massive increases in public education spending.

Many parents want a better education and safer schools for their children. The best way to deliver on that desire is to offer parents alternatives to poorly performing and unsafe public schools. Expansion of charter schools is one way to provide choice. The problem is that charter school waiting lists number in the tens of thousands. Another way is giving educational vouchers or tuition tax credits for better-performing and safer schools. But the education establishment fights tooth and nail against any form of school choice.
 

mrj

Well-known member
Too much of that is 'sad, but true'. When did we stray from the local control is best theory and fall for the 'big brother knows best' line?

In the early days of this country, families did their best to find good teachers for their children and educate them to the highest levels possible for their means and inclination. Often, in the early days of this area, some great teachers of basic education were students barely out of high school, sometimes teaching the year following their own graduation, and had students nearly as old as themselves!

Now, we start kids in 'school' awfully young. My great grand daughter, age three and a half, will begin pre-kindergarten in a few days. She already knows the alphabet and recognizes letters and numbers.....and can tell you how to start a pickup or move cattle up the chute! I fear her education will be compromised in 'school'!

Vouchers and more ability to transfer would be one step in solving education problems. Another would be more local control. Continuing testing and real evaluations of teachers couldn't hurt. Throwing ever more money per student sure hasn't improved actual education, either. How much should a good education cost per student, anyway. We never hear anything about that, only that more money is needed!!!

mrj
 
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