Homeschool Heroes; L. W. Reed

Ideas and Consequences Homeschool Heroes by Lawrence W. Reed O f all the ingredients in the recipe for education, which one has the greatest potential to improve student performance? No doubt the teachers unions would put higher salaries for their members at the top of the list, to which almost every reformer might reply, "Been there, done that." Teacher com pensation has soared in recent decades at the same time every indicator of student perfor mance has plummeted. Other answers include smaller class size, a longer school year, more money for com puters, or simply more money for fill-in-the blank. The consensus of hundreds of studies over the past several years is that these factors exhibit either no positive correlation with better student performance or show only a weak connection. On this important question, the verdict is in and it is definitive: The one ingredient that makes the most difference in how well and how much children learn is parental involvement.

When parents take a personal interest in the education of their children, several things happen. The child gets a strong message that education is important to success in life; it isn't something that parents dump in someone else's lap. Caring, involved parents usually instill a love of learning in their children-a love that translates into a sense of pride and achievement as knowledge is accumulated and put to good use. Time spent with books Lawrence W Reed, economist and author, is presi dent ofthe Mackinac Center for Public Policy, a free market research and educational organization head quartered in Midland, Michigan. 69 goes up and time wasted in the streets goes down. American parents were once responsible for educating their children. Until the late nineteenth century, the home, the church, and a small nearby school were the primary centers of learning for the great majority of Americans.

In more recent times, many American parents have largely abdicated this responsi bility, in favor of the "experts" in the com pulsory public school system. According to a 1996 report from Temple University in Penn sylvania, "nearly one in three parents is seri ously disengaged from their children's edu cation." The Temple researchers found that about one-sixth of all students believe their parents don't care whether they earn good grades and nearly one-third say their parents have no idea how they are doing in school. Amid the sorry state of American educa tion today are heroes who are rescuing chil dren in a profoundly personal way. They are the homeschoolers-parents who sacrifice time and income to teach their children themselves. Homeschooling is the ultimate in parental involvement. Teaching children at home isn't for every one and no one advocates that every parent try it. There are plenty of good schools-many private and some public-that are doing a better job than some parents could do for their own children. But the fact is that home schooling is working-and working surpris inglywell-for the growing number of parents and children who choose it. That fact is all 70 THE FREEMAN • FEBRUARY 1997 the more remarkable when one considers that these dedicated parents must juggle teaching with all the other demands and chores of modern life. Also, they get little or nothing back from what they pay in taxes for a public system they don't patronize.

While about 46 million children attend public schools and more than 5 million attend private schools, estimates of the number of children in homeschools nationwide range from 900,000 to 1.2 million. That's a compar atively small number, but it's up from a mere 15,000in the early 1980s.In fact, homeschool enrollment has been growing by an astound ing 25 percent annually for several years. Parents who homeschool do so for a variety of reasons. Some want a strong moral or religious emphasis in their children's educa tion. Others are fleeing unsafe public schools or schools where discipline and academics have taken a backseat to fuzzy "feel-good" or politically correct dogma. Many homeschool parents complain about the pervasiveness in public schools of trendy instructional methods that border on pedagogical malpractice. Homeschool parents are fiercely protective of their constitutional right to educate their children. In early 1994, the House of Repre sentatives voted to mandate that all teach ers-including parents in the home-acquire state certification in the subjects they teach.

A massive campaign of letters, phone calls, and faxes from homeschoolers produced one of the most stunning turnabouts in legisla tive history: By a vote of 424 to 1, the House reversed itself and then approved an amend ment that affirmed the rights and indepen dence of homeschool parents. Critics have long harbored a jaundiced view of parents who educate children at home. They argue that children need the guidance of professionals and the social interaction that come from being with a class of others. Homeschooled children, these critics say,will be socially and academically stunted by the confines of the home. But the facts suggest otherwise. A 1990 report by the National Home Education Research Institute showed that homeschooled children score in the 80th percentile or higher, meaning that they scored better than 80 percent of other students in math, reading, science, language, and social studies. Reports from state after state show homeschoolers scoring significantly better than the norm on college entrance examina tions. Prestigious universities, including Har vard and Yale, accept homeschooled children eagerly and often. And there's simply no evidence that homeschooled children (with a rare exception) make anything but fine, solid citizens who respect others and work hard as adults.

Homeschool parents approach their task in a variety of ways. While some discover texts and methods as they go, others plan their work well before they start, often assisted by other homeschoolers or associations that have sprung up to aid those who choose this option. Common to every homeschool parent is the belief that the education of their children is too important to hand over to someone else. Writing in the July 1996 issue of Reason magazine, Britton Manasco argues that the growth of CD-ROMs, Internet services, and computerized educational networks is likely to make homeschooling even more attrac tive to parents. For a tiny fraction of what a printed version might cost, one software pub lisher is offering a classic books program that incorporates more than 3,500 unabridged literary works, complete with hundreds of video clips and illustrations. A support group in Ann Arbor, Michigan, provides inexpen sive on-line help, resources, and evaluations for thousands of homeschool children world wide. Another organization links first-rate instructors and homeschool students from all over the country via computer in a college preparatory program that includes a core curriculum for about $250 per course.

In every other walk of life, Americans traditionally regard as heroes the men and women who meet challenges head-on, who go against the grain and persevere to bring a dream to fruition. At a time when more troubles and shortcomings plague education and educational heroes are too few in num ber, recognizing the homeschool heroes in our midst may be both long overdue and highly instructive. D THEFREEMAN IDEAS ON LIBERTY PropertyRightsAmong NativeAmericans by Terry L. Anderson C hief Seattle, a nineteenth-century Native American leader, is often quoted as say ing, "All things are connected like the blood which unites one family. Whatever befalls the earth, befalls the sons of earth." Those who invoke these words are usually attempting to convey the impression that Native Americans were guided by a unique environmental ethic. Yet the words in the oft-quoted speech are not actually those of Chief Seattle. And the message of the speech does not ring true, either. For Native Amer icans, traditions and customs-including property rights-were more important in en couraging careful use of resources than was an environmental ethic, however important that ethic may have been.