Fw: [ComingHome] insulting homeschoolers
Posted by: amazinggraze <amazinggraze@...>
From: "Frohmader family" <buksnort@mwt.net>
To: <mailto:Undisclosed-Recipient:@westbyserver.mwt.net>
Sent: Sunday, July 01, 2001 6:42 PM
Subject: [ComingHome] insulting homeschoolers
This editorial appeared in the Seattle Times and is incredibly insulting to
homeschoolers every where. If you disagree with this
article I strongly urge you to write an e-mail to the author of this
editorial. Her e-mail address can be found at the bottom of the
article.
seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/editorialsopinion/134311368_harrop28.h
tml
Thursday, June 28, 2001, 12:00 a.m. Pacific
Questioning the motives of home-schooling parents
America's most famous home-schooling parents at the moment are Andrea Yates
and JoAnn McGuckin. Yates allegedly drowned
her five children in a Houston suburb. McGuckin was arrested and charged
with child neglect in Idaho. Her six kids barricaded
themselves in the family's hovel when child-care workers came to remove
them.
The intention here is not to smear the parents who instruct 1.5 million
mostly normal children at home. But a social phenomenon
that isolates children from the outside world deserves closer inspection.
The home-schooling movement runs an active propaganda machine. It portrays
its followers in the most flattering terms - as
bulwarks against the moral decay found in public, and presumably private,
schools. Although now associated with conservative
groups, modern home-schooling got its start among left-wing dropouts in the
'60s.
Home-schooled students do tend to score above average on standardized tests.
The most likely reason, however, is that most of
the parents are themselves upper income and well educated. Students from
those backgrounds also do well in traditional schools.
Advocates of home-schooling have become a vocal lobbying force in
Washington, D.C. Children taught at home may be socially
isolated, but the parents have loads of interaction. Membership in the
anti-public-education brigade provides much comradeship.
The mouthpiece for the movement, the Home School Legal Defense Association
(http://www.hslda.org), posts articles on its Web site
with headlines like, "The Clinging Tentacles of Public Education." Trashing
the motivations of professional teachers provides much
sport.
Perhaps the time has come to question the motives of some home-schooling
parents. Are the parents protecting their children from
a cesspool of bad values in the outside world? Or are the parents just
people who can't get along with others? Are they "taking
charge" of their children's education. Or are they taking their children
captive?
Yates and McGuckin are, of course, extreme cases and probably demented. But
a movement that insists on parents' rights to do
as they wish with their children gives cover for the unstable, for
narcissists and for child-abusers.
In West Akron, Ohio, reporters would interview Thomas Lavery on how he
successfully schooled his five children in their home.
The kids all had top grades and fine manners. They recalled how their father
loved to strut before the media.
Eventually, however, the police came for Lavery and charged him with nine
counts of child endangerment. According to his
children, Lavery smashed a daughter over the head with a soda can after she
did poorly in a basketball game. Any child who wet
a bed would spend the night alone, locked in the garage.
A child who spilled milk had to drop on his or her knees and lick it up from
the floor. And in an especially creepy attempt to
establish himself as master, Lavery would order his children to damn the
name of God.
The best way to maintain the sanctity of a family madhouse is to keep the
inmates inside. Allowing children to move about in the
world could jeopardize the deal.
In some cases, it might also prevent tragedy. Suppose one of Andrea Yates'
children had gone to a school and told a teacher of
the mother's spiraling mental state. The teacher could have called a
child-welfare officer and five little lives might have been
saved.
Putting the horror stories aside, there's something sad about home-schooled
children. During the New Hampshire presidential
primary race, I attended an event directed at high-school and college
students. The students were a lively bunch, circulating
around the giant room, debating and arguing. Except for my table.
About four young people and a middle-aged woman were just sitting there. The
teenagers were clearly intelligent and well
behaved. I tried to chat, but they seemed wary of talking with strangers.
The woman proudly informed me that they were her
children and home-schooled.
The Home School Legal Defense Association condemns government interference
in any parent's vision of how a child might be
educated. The group's chairman, Michael Farris, says things like, "We just
want to say to the government: We are doing a good
job, so leave us alone."
Could that be where JoAnn McGuckin found her twisted sense of grievance?
"Those are my kids," she said as Idaho removed her
children from their filthy home. "The state needs to mind its own business."
Froma Harrop's column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. She
can be contacted via e-mail at
fharrop@projo.com.
Copyright © 2001 The Seattle Times Company
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