The point is, the parents and kids alike don't get that they're learning bad science till the kid is failing college Bio 101.

Fair enough, but I think that for the informed parent, it supports homeschooling. Or not, if the informed parent agrees with what's being taught, and the effect it may have on Bob's PhD.

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I just want to note this: yes, those *are* choices, but sometimes, Hec, you come across as though the only correct choice is the one that you support. But really, there's often more than one correct choice.

Sorry Tep, I really don't feel like I'm making a judgement about individual choices here at all, and I've tried to make that clear. As noted, I don't expect anybody to sacrifice their child on a poor public education. I wouldn't, and I've paid for Emmett's schooling before, and it was the right choice at the time. There are way too many variables involved in the decision to make a blanket judgement on it (despite my tendencies.)

I see the trend toward home schooling dangerous to the democratic ideal which I value. First people pulled their kids out of public schools. Then they started pulling them out of school altogether. I don't think that's the right direction. People don't seem as invested or committed to public education as they once did. And also I dislike the shift toward closed, hermetic, anti-social parenting.

But both of these objections are matters to be considered on balance. On the respective scales, I think they both represent a shift away from healthiest/best social values (my opinion, obviously). But I would like to see the weights moved more to the middle. I would like to see the value of public education more heavily weighted and valued. I would like to see more recognition of the virtue of social connection and community, rather than Me/Mine/Ours.

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I haev nothing but pity for the kids who grow up in small-town Kansas, learning bad science about evolution

To be fair, Kansas isn't really that backward about evolution. I think evolution is actually still a required part of the science curriculum, but it probably will be made optional again pretty soon. Even then, it will still be taught most places.

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Actually, I don't think smart kids suffer too much from mediocre schools. I think they'll excel anyway, and they'll get happy teacher attention.

I didn't. I didn't excel after a point--and yet I didn't get teacher attention, because I was good. Every standardized test I took put me in the 99th percentile for every subject. Ever. Every one. I had the special IQ test, because the results of my standard IQ test everyone else took were so above and beyond. I got bored, lost all motivation, and sadly, was the oldest and only child, so my folks didn't know the ins and outs of the school system. I wasn't on drugs. I wasn't being abused. They just lost me at some point--this good, oh so bright kid. I wasn't the only one. I lived in a bedroom community of Boston, solidly middle class, with no huge social ills or crime issues.

I really don't believe that's an even bet.

I think a parent can make it better than even, with rigourous attention to detail -- in favour of homeschooling. I'm not saying all or most do, but that's a parental failing, not a failing of the premise.

I am with ita, here, even though I don't personally think my children and I are well served by me home schooling them. I can get everything else somewhere else. My kids can be in Scouts, sports, and other group activities. They get group socialization at church and in family situations. We live on a child safe street. We have playgrounds within walking distance. We can join the Y.

My kids are in public school because I think I'd be a stress freak if they were home, and because our particular little school is a nice little school, that a lot of dedicated teachers and parents work their butts off, to keep it a nice, little school.

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I do think it's insane that we are revisting the Scopes trial here in 2005 though.

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I have data entry on 150 records to do in the next hour. music is required. go go iTunes party shuffle.

I haven't seen another person in over an hour. gak.

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I actually know someone who majored in biology at Bob Jones. He had to retake all his classes elsewhere before applying for graduate programs.

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Gud, am I wrong that, for a while (I want to say, beginning in 1998) the Kansas State School Board dropped evolution as a required topic? It was a whole big thing being reported at the time.

First people pulled their kids out of public schools. Then they started pulling them out of school altogether.

Although I don't think that home schooling necessarily means "hermetically sealed universe", I do like to remember that in a lot of places, the racial integration of public schools was followed immediately by the placing of white children into private schools. Which always struck me as a bitter, defeated thing to do, and the kids have to have come out the other end of that with some kind of screwed-up ideas about what's normal in today's world.

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When I was a kid in Milwaukee, in the midst of school integration, I was the one of the only kids on our block to go to public school. The schools were good, but they were diverse and there was a LOT of white flight going on.

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Fair enough, but I think that for the informed parent, it supports homeschooling.

Does it? One of my best friends from college went to a public high school in the middle of nowhere, Tennessee, where she got funny looks from both teachers and students for admitting she believed in evolution. But her parents made sure she had access to better science materials at home than the school was providing, and she made it through Northwestern as an anthropology major with no problems at all.

I think homeschooling has enough drawbacks and too few advantages that it should be considered a last resort, if that.

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