By Margaret Zen

For about a year now, I've been reading a weekly column called "Why We Homeschool," by a homeschooling mom and author named LauraMaery Gold. The column reports media accounts of homeschooling—positive and negative—so that homeschoolers can know what people are reading and saying about our movement.

No, I don't dislike public educators at all. In fact, I like most educators. I admire them, respect them, and think they deserve to be honored. With one evil exception (and a few incompetent ones), I myself had good teachers when I was a student.

I believe the great majority of teachers are good, decent, honorable people who teach for altruistic reasons. They love children, and want to improve the world. In fact, I believe the vast majority of educators are kind and decent, and enter the profession out of selflessness.

(Let it be said, though, that the same is true of most people who choose to become parents. They're good and decent, and don't require outside supervision to do their jobs. Having conceived and borne children, nursed them, changed their diapers, nurtured, raised and taught those children, parents are incontrovertibly the best judges of their own children's individual educational, emotional and psychological needs. That's why we call 'em parents!)

I believe that on the whole, people in general are good and honorable, and behave out of compassion and decency when it comes to children.

At the same time, though, there are, indisputably, awful people who enter the teaching profession—or stay in it after the shine wears off—for terrible reasons, and those reasons impact homeschoolers. These awful people teach not because they love teaching, but because it gives them access to children. Your children. Your children's friends. Your friends' children.

Some of those people are pedophiles. And a disturbing number flat-out enjoy terrorizing children. Wielding power. Or exercising domination. These are not nice people, and they want your children back under their province. They're angry that you're taking away their power by homeschooling, and they're on a campaign to get it back.

What's the foundation for my assertions about power-mongering educators? (Let me repeat myself, so that nothing I say is taken out of context: Most teachers are good people.) But I've been tracking the news stories for a year now. There's hardly a week that goes by when I don't find a dozen stories of molestations. Assaults. Verbal and emotional abuse. There are some serious sociopaths in public schools, and they aren't there out of altruism.

The second foundation: I survey people about why they homeschool. An astonishing number of people say they're homeschooling because their children were being maligned, mistreated, mocked, or otherwise abused by public schools. These aren't stories that make national news. They're stories that get acted out quietly, by families who don't take their stories to the newspapers. They simply take their children out of school, and go about their business.

OK, so there are awful people out there. Why should homeschoolers care?

Because there is growing pressure from organizations of public educators to get your children back into public schools. And these educators use as their argument spurious accusations against homeschoolers. These assertions are made without research, without statistics, without any basis in scholarship. And yet, they continue to be made by politicians sympathetic to the largest organization of teachers (the NEA), and by people who call themselves scholars. Here's one that causes me particular outrage:

From The Principal News, a publication for Washington State school principals, under the heading "Potential Home-schooling Risks":

"Not all home-schooling is a positive leaming [sic] experience for the child. In some instances, home-schooling is inconsistent, allowing gaps in the child's learning. Schools often find themselves later scrambling to identify and fill these gaps. The risk also exists that the daily process of learning to work and get along with others will be missed. Many home-schooling parents find ways to incorporate socialization into their child's life. We know that much of what is learned at school is outside of specific academic content areas. Teamwork is an essential life skill.

"A small but disturbing number of parents use home-schooling as a guise to prevent the detection of child abuse. By nature and structure, schools are well-positioned to observe signs of abuse. School personnel are able to talk with children, and when needed, report signs of abuse to Child Protective Services. Home-schooling makes this monitoring more difficult." (Original posted at <www.awsp.org/pnws9899-1.htm>, and still publicly available at the date of this writing.)

What's the source of this Orwellian animosity? Easy. It's the politically powerful National Education Association, on a campaign to regain control over your children.

The NEA is incensed that you have taken control over your own children's education, and it is determined to take back its lost power. Don't believe it? Then you haven't read the NEA's resolution against homeschooling—passed not just once, but twice: "The National Education Association believes that home schooling programs cannot provide the student with a comprehensive education experience."

Are you surprised? There's more: "When home schooling occurs, students enrolled must meet all state requirements. Home schooling should be limited to the children of the immediate family, with all expenses being borne by the parents/guardians. Instruction should be by persons who are licensed by the appropriate state education licensure agency, and a curriculum approved by the state department of education should be used."

It doesn't end there:

"The Association also believes that home-schooled students should not participate in any extracurricular activities in the public schools.

"The Association further believes that local public school systems should have the authority to determine grade placement and/or credits earned toward graduation for students entering or re-entering the public school setting from a home school setting." <www.nea.org/resolutions/00/00b-68.html>

During the 2000 presidential campaign, the Democratic National Committee posted at its Web site a bald-faced attack on homeschooling. The site attacked the state of Texas for being "lenient" on homeschoolers, and repeated the NEA's "concerns" about untrained parents teaching their own children, and its assertions that homeschooling is a cover for truancy. (The original posting appeared at, but has since disappeared from, this site: <http://www.democrats.org/gopwatch/bushwatch/accountability/home.html>)

The DNC's attack on homeschooling wasn't without precedent. In his last year in office, former US President Clinton, on a two-day "school reform tour," announced "If you're going to [operate a home school], your children have to prove that they're learning on a regular basis, and if they don't prove that they're learning then they have to go into a school—either into a parochial or private school or a public school." (An interesting analysis of Clinton's position appears in the Cato Institute's "Homeschooling and Histrionics.")

In a misguided newspaper editorial that supports the local superintendent's unfounded assertion that half of local homeschoolers aren't receiving instruction: "Finally, those who abuse and misuse the home school law should be identified by both the school systems and the legitimate home school parents. Although enforcing the law is difficult for school administrators, those children may have other risks in their lives that need attention. It's in all our interests to see that those children don't slip through the cracks because of bad decisions being made by their parents." <mainstreetnews.com/Arch/99/1117/JHOpinion.html>

A California county attorney told a reporter, "many homeschoolers are religious fanatics and people who neglect their children." Turns out this instance of zealotry was only the tip of an iceberg. <www.cahomeschoolnet.org/legalnews/legal05.htm>

And yet another anti-homeschooling assertion, without any foundation in research or scholarship. This is posted by Jackson State Community College, and purports to come from the journal CQ Researcher: "Increasing numbers of American parents are keeping their children home for their education. While in the past home schooling was associated with hippie communes and fundamentalist Christians, in recent years the practice has attracted thousands of career-minded families who fear the poor academic standards, large class size and violence associated with the public school system. Critics say that home schooling risks isolating children from other kids and society at large." <www.jscc.cc.tn.us/users/libjscc/using/topics.html>

Those who buy into the NEA's position need to back away from the hysterics, and think. OK, somewhere out there in the great wide world there is probably a homeschooling parent—maybe even five or six homeschooling parents—who abuse their children. Maybe.

Let's consider the implications of that:

• Is there any evidence that this make-believe, undiscovered abusive homeschooler would be less abusive if his or her children were in public school? Of course not. People who abuse children can do so regardless of their interaction with public schools. No matter how long the school day, the fact is that American children are in school only during school hours, and are under the influence of their parents the remainder of the time. Parents with an inclination to abuse never lack opportunity.

• Is there any evidence that public schools—with their focus on competition, grades, popularity, prestige and mandatory testing—do anything to lessen incidences of children being abused? To the contrary. They create difficulties between parents and children where none need exist. A parent who might be easy-going and relaxed teaching his or her own children faces stress, pressure, and demands from public educators that actually increase the likelihood of abuse. History abounds with stories of children who were beaten—or worse—because they brought home bad report cards or were suspended from school. It's a problem that simply doesn't happen when parents homeschool.

• And most significant: The implied assertion of the NEA and its ilk is that children are actually better off—safer—in public schools than at home. Is there any evidence that schools are safer places for children than homes? Absolutely not. As documented in Why We Homeschool, children in public schools are regularly brutalized and victimized both by classmates and by educators. School is not a benign, safe, comfortable womb. It's a brutal, harsh institution where children are regularly subject to humiliation, crime, immorality, bad examples, peer pressure, profanity, age-inappropriate sexuality, indoctrination, and sexual, verbal and emotional abuse.

• Error-filled science textbooks being used by 85 percent of public-school students in America.
• US Surgeon General report warns parents to more closely monitor their children's friendships, because peers strongly influence children to commit acts of violence.
• Michigan schools join nationwide trend toward school programs that enable -- some would say, encourage -- parents to "ditch" their children for as much as 12 hours a day.
• California boy charged with felony for bringing unloaded pellet gun to school.
• Tennessee boy arrested for bringing unloaded pellet gun to school for after-school target practice.
• Gay activists focus on expanding in-school programs to teach children to accept homosexuality, in themselves and in others.
• Massachusetts gets half a million federal dollars to expand programs that teach children how to ace standardized exams.
• Girl suspended for defending herself from assault
• Four suspended in Michigan school stabbing
• Gun threats in schools in Seattle and Illinois
• Police say they'll not hesitate to use deadly force against children who make threats
• School shooting in Sweden.
• Parent and elementary teacher in fistfight
• Alaska teacher molests student
• Teacher acquited as 'goofy' for blowing kisses on female students' stomachs
• Boy suspended for writing a dramatic presentation on school violence. Educators organize to decry sympathetic media reports.
• Principal impregnates 14-year-old student; may lose certification for a few years.

And Finally?

The most important reason for documenting these incidences of educational abuse: Because somebody should. Because there's an epidemic of abuse against children committed in public schools by educators who take advantage of their position of power to molest, assault, malign, mock, and humiliate children. It's time somebody said, loudly and clearly, that institutionalizing children is a failed experiment, and that in nearly every case, they're better off at home, with loving parents, than warehoused in a system whose primary goal is self-perpetuation.

Do I believe public schools should be closed down? Maybe. There are plenty of people—people who aren't even homeschoolers—who would support that position. So it's a philosophical point that deserves contemplation.

But there's a third alternative: It's my belief that we need to find a way to use our resources better, so that all parents—even those who don't homeschool—can be far, far more involved in their children's educations.

I have a dream. I dream of public schools being turned into public resource centers. Of classrooms filled with parents and their children, as well as with computers, books, and laboratory resources. Where parents and children work together with the assistance—not the supervision—of master educators who can facilitate learning. No more outdated textbooks. No more grading, or competition. Just education and interaction. Pure. Simple. Involved. And loving.

Schools could be wonderful places. But right now, they're hostile places. Places that are hostile to families, that intentionally separate children from parents, that are more about indoctrination and control than about academics.

In my dream world, schools become the functional equivalent of public libraries. Go or don't go. Use them or don't. Take advantage of their resources in a manner that reinforces togetherness, rather than divisiveness. Take classes with your children. Study together, learn together, find answers together. Or pick and choose child-centered classes that suit a child's individual interests or needs -- just as you would a ballet class or a judo class. Graduation "happens" whenever the child is prepared to take on the world, not at some arbitrary age established by people who'll never even meet your children.

That's my dream. And that's the reason I'm going to continue to agitate against a system that seeks to institutionalize children, separate them from their families, and indoctrinate and control them. That, my friends, is abuse.