Homeschooling

Homeschooling as a potential preferred alternative to public and private schools is the subject of Homeschool Co-Ops Tap Pooled Resources.

According to the article, the growth of homeschooling in recent years results from a widening dissatisfaction with the current education system, "Initially motivated largely for religious reasons but now including many people who are frustrated with the current education system, homeschooling has swelled across the country. There were 1.5 million students being homeschooled nationwide in 2007, the latest figures available, up from 850,000 students in 1999, according to the U.S. Department of Education. The department doesn't track co-ops."

It goes on, "For a lot of people, this really is a vote of no confidence in the public-school system."

I often wonder why taxpayers accept spending so much money on public schools while receiving so little in return with respect to value for the taxpayer expenditures made. It's truly unfortunate that complacency about the quality of education has settled in around the nation. Our schools used to be great, and now they aren't.

As in most other situations, I guess the value received in education (value = quality of output in relation to taxpayer money expended) isn't at all dissimilar to other taxpayer supported endeavors run by our government and public employee union officials. Governments waste lots of money, whatever the purpose.

One especially troublesome and lame excuse for the failure of inner city public education results comes from the teachers unions. They largely attribute poor student performance in the inner city to poverty and not in any way to school administrators or teachers. For the sake of argument, let's assume that what they say is true.

If poverty is indeed the underlying cause of poor performance in the inner city classroom, why do we continue to spend so much money on those schools? If education in the inner city is a losing cause until such time as poverty is eradicated, then let's shift gears completely and focus on poverty alone.

In other words, wouldn't students be better off if the taxpayers' public money were focused on employment opportunities for more people in the inner city as opposed to more teachers for those impoverished students who, according to the teachers unions, can't or won't learn anyway?

Simply put, it doesn't make sense to say that student performance can't improve because of poverty and then say let's spend more money on educating the impoverished.

By the way, I don't buy into the teachers union argument at all. Proven examples such as KIPP schools, other charter schools and lots of parochial school examples flatly contradict what the teachers union argues.

Here's the real story. Almost all kids, both rich and poor, can perform at historically high levels, given the right conditions. But the "right conditions" simply aren't being offered by most government run schools today.

In addition to the right conditions not being present in far too many of our public schools, without taxpayer assistance (think vouchers) private schools simply aren't affordable for most Americans.

Accordingly, it's nice to see ongoing educational experiments (attempting to get great results while spending less money) like the referenced new San Francisco homeschooling co-op example.

Let's resolve to never stop trying to make education work as intended for all those kids and parents who are willing to make the required effort to attain a first rate education.

As we do, educational results will not only improve dramatically, but this improvement will cost taxpayers far less than the present government/teachers union run schools cost today.

Thanks. Bob.