This is a great article on the history of public education. I will bookmark it. Now, as for homeschooling. How far does that go? K-12? If so that is feasable but many parents do not have the education themselves for home schooling much less the time or devotion to do it. That being said, there is a real need for competition with the public school system and that will come only with some type of voucher system. Absent that there needs to be the political will to shut down schools that serve as indoctrination centers and warehouses.
As far as vouchers are concerned you can bet that between the public school administrators and the teachers unions they will fight the loss of funding tooth and nail.
Homeschooling can be from k-12, yes. The commitment to school one's child at home rather than in a public setting is great. We're finishing our 6th year homeschooling and have no regrets or reservations of continuing on to 7th. There are about 1.7 million homeschoolers in the United States at present. That figure is growing by 10-15% yearly. I would venture to say that the desire and interest to homeschool is obviously growing. These particular parents seek the best for their children. In their case, homeschooling is the best.
HSLDA (Home School Legal Defense Association) has stats on nat'l test scores of homeschoolers compared to their public schooled peers. In addition, there are stats on parents who don't hold a college degree...their children still exceed the nat'l testing by 20-30%. Same goes for those with parents holding advanced degrees.
There are literally hundreds, if not thousands, of avenues to use in making the schooling experience enriching and worthwhile. The one on one tutoring alone makes all the difference. More difficult classes can be conducted using cd-rom/video, internet class, coop class, or attending class at the local junior college. Most homeschooled youth become self learners....lifelong learners.
I lead a homeschool support group of 34 families. The education levels of the parents run the course of barely a high school diploma to a PhD. The commitment to their children is the same. Devotion to their children is paramount.
HomeSchooling goes K-12; in addition, most homeschooling courses are sufficiently flexible to easily allow "dropping into" a Religious or Private School and/or "dropping out" into Homeschooling therefrom (I speak from familial, albeit not personal, experience). Homeschooling courses do not, however, usually integrate as easily with Publik Skooling... too much "culture shock" and disparity in Educational Quality.
If so that is feasable but many parents do not have the education themselves for home schooling much less the time or devotion to do it.
Combined Federal, State, and Local spending on Publik Skooling amounts to over $7,000 per-child, per-year... and with the passage of the Kennedy/BushJunior "education" bill, expect the pig-trough to get even fatter.
Just return that money directly to the parents via the abolition of the Property, Sales, and Income Taxes which support Publik Skooling. If you want to do so in a manner which "helps" the poor, you can abolish the Sales Taxes first... oh, and abolish State Lotteries also, which amount to a "tax" on the Poor to subsidize Middle Class schools.
A fairly-high-grade (substantially better than Publik Skool, anyway) Private Religious Academy education in a Classical format (Greek, Latin, Logic and Rhetoric included in the basic curriculum) can be had for 60-70% the cost of Publik Skooling... $350 to $400 per month -- again, I speak from familial experience on the matter. Just give Parents back their money; those that have the time and ability to Home-School may keep the cash, those who lack the time and ability to Home-School may spend less money on a better Private/Religious product.
That being said, there is a real need for competition with the public school system and that will come only with some type of voucher system. Absent that there needs to be the political will to shut down schools that serve as indoctrination centers and warehouses.
Yes, the Political Will is grossly lacking at this time.
I disagree. You are basically giving Uncle Sham permission to seize your money, then give you a few coupons in return with the understanding that if you qualify (Lord only knows what THAT would entail) you can send your children to a private school - which in turn would become subject (since they're taking coupons from Uncle Sham) to any kind of rules (like this revised Pledge) that Uncle Sham may decide to pass.
So in reality, you would end up with more of the same. No thanks.