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Your wife must have encountered the former homeschooling students whose parents were not that competent to begin with. Most of the homeschoolers whom I have come into contact with are incredibly self-sufficient in both their social and educational skills.

It's been my experience as a homeschooling parent that the few homeschooling families who decided (for whatever reason) to put their kids back into the public schools have pretty much given up on the homeschooling experience. They were probably not very good homeschoolers to begin with. Homeschooling is not for every family. It takes patience, dedication, discipline and organizational skills to achieve good homeschooling results.

I would never consider placing my fifteen-year-old son back into a public or private school environment--even if he begged me! Fortunately, my son despised middle school and believes that most public school "socialization" is bogus.

I took my son out of public schools at the beginning of 7th grade. Up until then, his education consisted mostly of teachers implementing PC programming courses (that the kids mocked and thought were stupid) and worring about the numerous state-mandated tests that seemed to pop-up every two months or so. (It's a wonder that any real teaching involving reading, writing and arithmatic got implemented!)

Both my husband and I have our son tested. Not because the state has compelled us to, but because we want to show the education establishment that we can do this--with spectacular results. Am I bragging? You bet. My son has already taken his SAT's and scored in the 99th percentile! He now attends the local junior college, along with several homeschoolers who are around his age.

And there are many success stories just like yours. I just think it is unfair... and more than that... inaccurate to lump all homeschoolers into your category. And at the same time lump all school teachers and districts into the worst category. There are good competent people on both sides of the issue.... and there are losers on both sides.