In the 2024-2025 school year, homeschooling continued to grow across the United States, increasing at an average rate of 5.4%. This is nearly three times the pre-pandemic homeschooling growth rate of around 2%. Notably, 36% of reporting states recorded their highest homeschool enrollment numbers ever — exceeding even the peaks reached during the pandemic.
I’m in a dilemma. My kid is nearing school age. My wife already stays at home with the kid. I live in a fairly rural, conservative area. My wife is a former science teacher and we both have masters degrees. I look at the people we live around and wonder, is it going to be a good idea to send my kid to school? Especially because they are already showing advanced capabilities.
Don’t isolate your kids. Even a school filled with kids raised by conservative parents is going to be better than sheltering your kids in a bubble.
I went to a rural school in the middle of Northern Wisconsin. I was raised by hyper conservative parents who are now MAGAts. They raised me to be homophobic, racist, and raised me in a cult.
When I went to high school there, I became friends with what we called “emo” kids back in the day. My best friend throughout high school was a lesbian girl I sat with at math class. She helped show me that LGBTQ+ people can actually be pretty freaking awesome and broke down my parent’s years of homophobic indoctrination by simply being herself. She introduced me to her other LGBTQ+ friends at the school and it was the best 2 years of primary school I ever had.
Humans are social creatures and you still “control” the majority of your kid’s time at home and on the weekends, as well as summer breaks. As long as you reinforce and foster kind-hearted humans, they’ll not only turn out fine, but they’ll also probably help someone in the same situation I was in. That’s how you change the world for the better, as a parent.
Source: Father of three boys in Texas (not completely by choice…my family lives here)
Social interaction is really, really important, right?
I think you aren’t giving other little kids enough credit. They aren’t their parents. I had good friends with awful family cultures, and I’m better for knowing them.
I think you may be judging ‘rural’ neighbors a little harshly, too. And your own kid, especially if they are bright.
…It doesn’t mean you can’t supplement their curriculum though, or advance them. My Dad grew up in a really poor area in the deep, deep south. But he just skipped grades, and didn’t come out as a religious nut or anything, and he didn’t have the benefit of two masters degrees parents.
…I’m bringing this up, because I also knew some homeschooled people, and I feel like it screwed them up. Different situation, but still, the isolation makes me very hesitant.
I was homeschooled. Its the best! “they need social interaction” yeah, but not necessarily with the retarded kids in public school, sorry… I got plenty enough social interactions. I had friends that went to public school. I played soccer, made friends there. I went to church, had friends there. My parents had friends who had kids I was friends with. I also surfed and liked other sports well enough. There were the neighborhood kids I was friends with, and I lived rural too. I had brother too. Enough about friends.
But yeah, if yall give homeschooling a good try and be committed I believe it is 1000% better than public school. And I think that is both because of education and social education. Some public school kids that I see -especially these days-… its just sad and pitiful… like cant read a clock or read or write cursive? There are so many bad influences too, I know that sounds cliche even, but its true. The wrong friends are worse than the wrong education, sometimes… Oh also both my older brothers are very successful, im a little less successful but still awesome, I make enough and live well. Im also the only one of my brothers that had a drug phase too though. But… im clean now and got shit back together.
Hey my mom also was a science teacher before she became a mom and started homeschooling!