All parents want their children to have the best education available, and many parents assume that their local public schools are providing this service. However, the public school system in the United States is flawed in many ways, and even if parents do realize that their child may be struggling, they often don’t know of any other options besides private schools which can be very expensive and not accessible to all families. On the other hand, an option that many families overlook in their search for a suitable education program is homeschooling. When considering the numerous issues that many students encounter in public schools and looking past common stereotypes and misconceptions that the general public often has about homeschooling, one can see that homeschooling has so much to offer children and can absolutely be an effective alternative to more mainstream styles of education that aren’t suited for the needs of every child.

I have two younger sisters, both of whom decided to leave private school and attend our local public middle and high schools in Fort Mill, South Carolina. Since they have been attending public school, my family has become increasingly aware of how many flaws there are in the system, especially since South Carolina’s public schools are ranked 37th out of 50 (Bernardo 2016). The funding for their school is terrible which leads to overworked and underpaid teachers; many of whom don’t care enough to provide supplemental instruction to a student who is struggling with the material. The curriculum also lacks any sort of creative or analytical thinking. These elements combined with an administration restricted by bureaucratic rules and regulations gives rise to a student body that has no love for learning or motivation to challenge themselves intellectually. 

Students all across the United States have even taken action to voice their opinions on the flawed system. In a Huffington Post piece titled "Has the American Education System Failed Today’s Students?", 18-year-old author Kaitlyn Kaminsky expresses her opinions by saying, “Since day one of school we have been taught to answer multiple choice questions and write essays” and “If you ask me how to write a check or how I’m going to pay for college I couldn’t even tell you where I would start” (Kaminsky 2014). In her writing, Kaminsky speaks for students as a whole when she says that public schools are not adequately preparing kids for the real world and that schools focus too much on test taking and college preparation rather than preparing them for what comes afterwards. Today public schools are putting so much pressure on students to pass tests and get into college that any sort of self-expression and creative learning is suppressed by the system, and Kaitlyn Kaminsky isn’t the only student who has publicly expressed her opinions on this faulty system. 

I recently watched a TEDx Talk titled “Hackschooling makes me happy” with a 13-year-old boy named Logan LaPlante whose parents saw he was struggling in public school and pulled him out to be homeschooled. Logan talks about how schools today aren’t teaching students how to live balanced, healthy, and happy lifestyles and the system is aimed towards teaching students how to one day make a living, not a life (Hackschooling 2013). In the talk, Logan introduces the term “Hackschooling” which he created to describe his customizable and creative way of learning that fills in all of the gaps in public school education. He coined the term by explaining that challenging or “hacking” the system actually makes it better and by doing so he was able to pinpoint which aspects of traditional school worked for him, which ones he struggled with, and was able to find alternative methods to learn those things. A major flaw in the public school system that Logan points out is that the stifled creativity in classrooms makes it incredibly hard for a lot of students to get an idea of what they want to do when they grow up or what they want to study when they get to college. This results in a lot of emotional stress as kids start to feel behind or bad about themselves if they don’t know what they want to do with their lives. Logan goes on to talk about how homeschooling, or “hackschooling” as he refers to it, gave him the freedom to travel and do the things he loves to do, like skiing, and through his experiences he decided that he wants to start his own ski equipment company one day and has already found multiple internships in the field at only 13-years-old (Hackschooling 2013). Logan’s story is an example of how public school is not suited for every student and doesn’t provide many kids with the diverse opportunities or extra help that they may need whereas homeschooling is able to provide a customizable education to suit the needs of every child.

The main reason why many Americans don’t think of homeschooling as a viable alternative to public schools is because of common stereotypes and misconceptions about the homeschooling process and the kinds of people who do it. In the article, “Parents as Teachers – Why Homeschooling Is a Bad Idea”, author and elementary school teacher Amy Ryan claims that homeschooling is not as effective as public schools because parents are not qualified to teach their children since they don’t have degrees, homeschooled kids often have social issues because they aren’t in a traditional school setting with other students, and schools provide materials and extracurricular activities such as music and art classes that kids can’t receive at home (Ryan 2012). The concerns that Ryan expresses in her article are the most common stereotypes and criticisms that most Americans have regarding homeschooling. However, the points she makes are often just that; stereotypes. 

The question of definition is important in this argument because many of the misconceptions that the public has about homeschooling stem from confusion as to what homeschooling actually entails. In the Huffington Post article “Homeschooling: Setting The Record Straight”, author and former homeschool student Chris Sosa interviews homeschool expert Mary Ann Kelley on these common stereotypes. When asked to explain what homeschooling really is, Kelley responded with “Although most people think of homeschooling as mom sitting at the kitchen table teaching her children, homeschooling is a broad term that is more of a reflection of opting out of the government school system than it is about education taking place with a parent in the home” (Sosa 2015). Kelley goes on to explain that there are many different forms of homeschooling, many of which involve online classes or enrollment in “academic co-ops” where teachers are carefully hired by the organizations and student attend classes with a small group of other students in the program. The stereotype that homeschooling is done solely by a parent who is not trained to teach their child is completely false, and if a parent does want to play a role in their child’s education there are hundreds of thousands of online resources available to provide parents with the tools to do so effectively. 

The largest concern that most homeschooling critics, such as Amy Ryan, have is the issue of socialization and whether or not kids who are homeschooled will have social issues or struggle forming relationships with friends and others throughout life. Homeschooled kids are often assumed to be “weird” or “anti-social” by outsiders who aren’t informed on the topic, but in reality this is very rarely the case. One parent interviewed for the article “Is Homeschooling a Good Option?” was asked about her thoughts on the claim that homeschooled kids are under-socialized. She responded with “Many homeschoolers spend their day doing things such as: helping out with family business, running errands, going on field trips, visiting relatives and friends, doing odd jobs for neighbors and partaking in family responsibilities.” She continued with “As the "socially challenged" homeschool kids are out and about, partaking and interacting in real life situations, the government students are "socializing" under a controlled environment, behind four walls with a controlled group of people (also known as their peer group)” (Immell 2009). As one can see, homeschool parents are often defensive about this topic because not only is the accusation insulting to them and their children, but it is simply not true. Another parent who was interviewed said, “The idea of a homogenous grouping of 25 to 30 children who sit at their desks all day long and do activities—to call that socialization is tortured. You and I don't live and function in that kind of environment” (Immell 2009). As the second interviewee said, adults in the real world don’t socialize solely with small groups of people their own age, so why should a classroom setting be considered the ideal environment for this type of interaction? Homeschooled kids are often even more “socialized” than students who attend public schools because they have experiences outside the classroom where they interact with other adults, and people of all backgrounds as opposed to a classroom full of kids their own age and a few teachers with whom the relationships are often cold, dismissive, or tolerable at best.

At first glance, one can see how these previously mentioned stereotypes can influence the general public’s opinion on the homeschool method. However, some research and inquiry into the topic will prove to anyone who is skeptical that parents who choose to homeschool their kids are not selfish or naïve and kids who are homeschooled are often more well-rounded and socialized from the unique experiences that their flexible education is able to provide. Another aspect of homeschooling that is important to consider when arguing it’s efficacy is the type of student that it would be well-suited for. Mary Ann Kelley, from the Huffington Post article mentioned earlier, talks about how homeschooling may not be for every family and if parents are satisfied with their child’s public school then that is great, however this is not always the case and homeschool is a great alternative for families who are zoned for public schools that are providing educations that are far less than satisfactory. Kelley also explains that good candidates for homeschooling are incredibly varied and “Diversity among homeschoolers is rich, with people from backgrounds that cross many social, religious, political, and lifestyle divides. Homeschooled kids might be gifted, delayed, athletic, intellectual, disabled or any combination of those (Sosa 2015)”. Homeschooling may not a perfect fit for every family, but for many parents it has been a saving grace when it comes their child’s education and future.

Overall, the education system in the United States does some things well but does many things very poorly. Students all across the country struggle not only with academics, but also with bullying, stifled creativity, lack of a well-rounded education, and also more long term consequences that could have lasting effects throughout college and early adulthood. Families often overlook the option of homeschooling because of various stigmas or stereotypes, but I am writing this essay with the hopes of educating the public on this alternative form of education that has been proven to be just as, if not more, effective than the more mainstream style of education found in public schools today. Once people realize how many educational and developmental gaps that homeschooling could potentially fill for their child and look past the misconceptions surrounding it, they may even ask themselves why they didn’t start homeschooling years ago.
