Homeschool.....should it be illegal

[Anonymous]

Their kid gets physically and emotionally abused and they are "stuck" sending their child to their zoned school. What the heck is wrong with those parents? Get your child out of there before there is permanent damage! Let's make sure we as parents have the right to do so.

This was our situation. My daughter was bullied within an inch of her life in public school -- during 4th and 5th grade at a "good" FCPS school, girls purposely sat next to the allergy table with peanut butter and Nutella (she is highly allergic), stared at her and taunted her during lunch, and would follow her around on the playground. The school did nothing until one of the girls wrote a note telling my daughter she should commit suicide, that no one would miss her. She was having panic attacks every day before school. So then COVID hit, and we have been homeschooling ever since. It literally saved her life. We should have made a change much, much earlier. Now we are looking at going back in a limited way under the partial homeschool regulations and it gives me great angst.

[Anonymous]

It's really amazing how when people start talking about homeschooling they act like regular schools "work." We have a mental health crisis. We have a bullying crisis. Kids are doing drugs and having sex in the bathroom in middle school. And, most kids in regular schools are not actually "learning," if by "learning" we mean performing on a standardized test -- look at the data on how many kids are performing "on grade level." The ones in the "good" schools are usually drilled into being good at standardized tests and getting into college, wahoo! But query what lessons they have learned about how to have a fulfilling life and behave like a responsible adult after having been helicoptered by status-anxious parents in an environment that presents schooling as a means to an end (Best College!), rather than a place to nurture one's individual curiosity and natural aptitudes and develop a lifelong love of learning.

Schooling is not synonymous with education. Let's stop pretending it is.