[Editor's note: This story originally was published by Real Clear Religion.]
By Kathleen Bustamante
Real Clear Religion
Earlier this month, the CDC updated its guidelines to recommend universal indoor masking for all teachers, staff, students, and visitors to K-12 schools regardless of vaccination status, and school districts across the country are implementing these rules. Burdensome guidelines force online and hybrid schooling on families who have poor internet access and on working parents who must oversee children’s school attendance while facing their own employment challenges. Social distancing proves a challenge for students attempting to communicate with old and new friends. And even if local schools are currently open, there is always a chance they might shut down again.
As the school year approaches, Americans have significant concerns, leaving parents – especially mothers – with difficult decisions: should they send their children to school for yet another year full of challenges, or should they homeschool instead?
Many feel unqualified to teach their youngsters, while others wonder how they can balance careers with educating their kids. But as homeschooling becomes normalized in America, more parents have realized they are already equipped with the tools necessary to teach their children, regardless of their own educational background or experience. And by educating their children at home, parents have found much-needed flexibility in how, when, and what their children learn, which for some, includes a religious education.
The U.S. Census Bureau reported that homeschooling more than doubled in 2020, and this increase as seen across all demographics. As Dr. Brian D. Ray of the National Home Education Research Institute noted, “Homeschooling is quickly growing in popularity among minorities. About 41% of homeschool families are non-white/non-Hispanic.” In fact, according to the Census Bureau, homeschooling increased nearly five-fold in Black households, from 3.3% to 16.1% within a three-to five-month time span.
I was plunged into the role of home educator when the pandemic reached my home state of Oregon. I struggled to balance my jobs as a freelance writer and college writing instructor with educating a first grader and a fifth grader. Minimal contact with my children’s teachers, who were equally unprepared for a global pandemic, required patience and flexibility on my part.
Our family survived the spring, but as fall 2020 crept closer, I realized Oregon schools would remain virtual for the foreseeable future. So I decided to invest in a homeschool curriculum and serve as their primary educator. The decision was terrifying. Although I am a teacher, my only classroom experience has been among adults. I felt ill-equipped to teach my own children; still, I joined the throngs of Americans who pulled their kids from traditional schools to give it a try.
I signed up for two homeschool cooperatives that meet weekly and give my children a chance to interact with other homeschooled students in a classroom setting and learn from other educators. These experiences forever changed my perspective about the intelligence and abilities of homeschool parents who provide a top-notch education for their children.
Both co-ops exposed me to knowledgeable and motivated supermoms who manage to oversee the education of their children while running a household – an impressive feat. Another shocker: not only are these women educated, but some even have careers on top of teaching their kids.
Leila Lopes began homeschooling her oldest after he finished kindergarten at a public school. Today, Lopes has four children between the ages of ten and two months old and she recently finished her fourth year homeschooling her oldest two. She is also a Registered Nurse of 14 years and is specially trained in oncology nursing.
Lopes recognizes that her degree and career in healthcare have aided in her homeschool journey, noting, “Anatomy and Physiology is my favorite subject at home. I can share my knowledge as a nurse and help the kids understand how our bodies work. I can share examples of patients I have cared for that have had pathologies of various body systems. I think it helps the kids understand the practical implications of illness or injury to our health and how that plays out in real life.”
Alex Tarpo, another mother of four, began homeschooling her oldest child, who is seven years old, because of the pandemic. Tarpo holds a doctorate degree in physical therapy and has worked as a physical therapist for eight years. She said she recognizes the ways her education and experience have benefited her as she teaches her children, noting “ultimately my science-based knowledge and learned work ethic will help in aiding my children to learn certain subjects and concepts, as well as skills and techniques for success.” She added that being well-rounded not only in knowledge, but also in her faith makes her a strong educator.
Brianne Happel, director of a Classical Conversations – a community for Christian families seeking a classical home education – in Tigard, Oregon, said that after homeschooling for over a decade, she has known homeschool moms with varying levels of education. “All of them are the best educators for their children because they know them more thoroughly and care more deeply about their futures than any professional could,” she said. “I've seen a passion and a drive to educate that is neither tied to, nor limited by, number of years spent in college. Humans do not lose their ability to learn once they become adults. Mothers learn anything necessary right alongside their children as they teach in a one-to-one setting.”
Happel said she knows homeschool moms who currently work in their degree fields while also homeschooling their kids, and that real-world, hands-on experience impacts their educational abilities while teaching their children. “Any experience we have as humans impacts what we impart to others,” she said. “Our careers, our interactions with neighbors, dealing with our aging parents; we cannot compartmentalize the various circles of our lives. They all intersect. The working homeschool moms I know have to carefully manage their time. They also spend more time experiencing the very thing they are often aspiring to change. They want their children to become adults who can thrive in various situations, who can think for themselves and think well, who love to learn and tackle new challenges.”
Although many mothers choose not to work, instead focusing solely on educating their children, the reality is that homeschooling is no longer an either-or situation, nor does it provide a subpar education.
As school districts and teacher unions grasp the ramifications of slipping control, attacks on Christian homeschoolers are on the rise. A Huffington Post article by senior editor Rebecca Klein equated Christian homeschoolers with “white Christian nationalists,” claiming language in some curricula popular among Christian homeschoolers “overlaps with the rhetoric of Christian nationalism, often with overtones of nativism, militarism and racism as well.”
Happel called these attacks absurd. “I know none of these characters,” she said. “As a Classical Conversations director, my mission is to help parents educate their children to become life-long learners: to experience the world around them as a classroom where the end of learning could never possibly be reached. Our goal is to teach children how to think, not what to think. Can the government schools today say the same for their educational goals?”
She added, “There is a substantial and growing population of homeschooling families today, all unique, with vastly different beliefs and reasons for why they homeschool. Sure, there are probably people who fit into their pigeonhole, but there are likely just as many or more of those ‘extreme religious ideologues’ promoting bad ideas in private and government schools alike.”
The perception by critics that homeschool parents are uneducated, homogenous extremists was toppled over the past year, as the changing demographics show.
While COVID-19 disrupted the lives of millions, it also delivered a surprising blessing. Thanks to the pandemic, the shift from parental observers to at-home educators has illuminated the innate ability of parents to effectively teach their children well and produce a new generation of intelligent, capable human beings.
Parents are taking back control of their children's education to produce critical thinkers and future leaders that our country desperately needs.
Kathleen Bustamante is a freelance writer and writing instructor in Portland, Oregon.
[Editor's note: This story originally was published by Real Clear Religion.]
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