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Back to School: School house rocked
Homeschooling is under the microscope—but proponents say the stereotypes are 'fundamentally' wrong...

by Joy Lanzendorfer

Ever since homeschooling came under fire last February, Marin homeschoolers have been nervous. A ruling from California's 2nd District Court of Appeal in a case looking into abuse in a homeschooling family stated that parents must have teaching credentials to educate their kids, something that has never been required before.

"When that court case came down, people freaked out," says Tamara Markwick, a homeschooler living in San Rafael. "It seemed like the majority of the way people are homeschooling might become illegal. People didn't want to talk to the press and have their name out there. They didn't want to say something that could come back and bite them."

This month, the same state appellate court reversed the decision and it looks as if homeschoolers won't have any new requirements in the near future. But the issue shone a light on homeschoolers, bringing up questions about who they are, why they chose homeschooling and, most controversially, are they capable of educating their children by themselves?

It's difficult to say how many homeschoolers live in California, let alone Marin County. The state doesn't do a careful headcount. The U.S. Department of Education estimates there are at least 500,000 homeschooled children in the U.S., although other studies say there could be as many as 2 million. In California, there are anywhere between 60,000 to 200,000 homeschoolers, according to the Homeschool Association of California.

Parents can homeschool several ways. They can employ a credentialed private tutor, which is how most child stars and athletes are educated. Or they can enroll the child in a private school with a satellite program for homeschooling, or in a public school with an independent study program. The last way to homeschool—and perhaps the most common—is to declare yourself a private school. All you have to do is file paperwork every year to let the state know of your existence.

For some people, homeschoolers seem like isolationists who hide their children away and teach them fundamentalist religious beliefs instead of math and reading. In reality, the homeschooling community is full of different family models, including single parents, stepparents and stay-at-home dads. While there may be more conservative Christians in the bunch—and in fact, there is a Christian homeschooling group in Marin—religion doesn't seem to be the main reason people choose this educational path.

"In [the group] Marin Homeschool Families, I can't pinpoint one person where religion is the main reason they homeschool," says Markwick. "And we're talking over 100 families here. We've had discussions about why we homeschool before and that issue has come up. Everyone has said that religion was not their main reason to homeschool. So that is a big myth."

This may be true for other parts of the Bay Area as well. While religion may enter into the decision to homeschool, it isn't always the main reason for it, according to Stephanie Hood of the Homeschool Association of California.

"Nationwide as a whole, it's probably true the majority of homeschoolers are conservative Christians," she says. "But speaking for Santa Clara County, where I live, it tends to not be the case. It's about 50/50 of Christian homeschoolers and people homeschooling for reasons other than religious world-view."

Some parents, like Markwick, choose to homeschool because they want a family-oriented learning environment. A single mom with two sons ages 4 and 11, Markwick supports her family through daycare. She takes on one or two young children at a time and fits them into her daily schedule. Not only do her children get more personal attention that way, they are more excited about learning.

"Being together and learning as a family is a huge benefit for us," she says. "And it just makes school fun. It's not a pressure situation. If my son doesn't get something, it's no big deal, we can set it aside and come back to it later. It's about the enjoyment of learning."

Other people pick homeschooling because public schools weren't able to address their child's special needs. When Helen Alvarez got married, she found that the public school was failing her two stepsons. One son was gifted, and although he excelled in certain subjects, other subjects went ignored. The other child had learning disabilities, which the school was unequipped to handle.

"I decided to homeschool to pay more attention to the one with learning disabilities and to be more proactive with the other," she says. "That way they get more attention for their learning differences."

Alvarez started splitting her day up, teaching one boy in the morning, the other in the afternoon. Her attempts were so successful that now, 13 years later, she is homeschooling her other two children, ages 10 and 12. The gifted stepson just finished graduate school.

Other homeschoolers are critical of public schools. Although half of every tax dollar in California goes to schools, in 2005, the state ranked 47th in education, meaning that only three other states scored worse on standardized tests.

However, Marin County has better-than-average schools with high graduation rates, test scores and per-pupil spending. In fact, last year Forbes magazine ranked Marin County as having among the best public schools for the money in the nation.

"At one extreme, there are kids who are living in an area where the schools are really truly ineffective," says Mark Phillips, professor of secondary education at San Francisco State University. "But it would be hard to find an area that fits that description in Marin. There are failings and limits of its schools, but most, by and large, are good schools."

Phillips, who lives in Woodacre and has worked in public schools for 40 years, has mixed feelings about homeschooling. On one hand, he sees the good side—freedom of learning, more physical freedom in the child's day, emotional support, escape from bullying and peer pressure and the parents' ability to incorporate their value system into the child's learning.

However, Phillips questions the quality of some homeschool teaching. There is nothing ensuring that parents are covering all the bases of their child's education. Although Phillips is against forcing parents to get teaching credentials, he would like to see more overview by the state when it comes to homeschooling.

"I would have anybody who wants to do homeschooling apply for a license," says Phillips. "And I would have standards developed as the basis for granting that license. It's not an attack on the parents struggling to find an alternative for their kids. I just want to see them working with the state to ensure both the rights and the responsibilities of the parents."

A child can get an equivalent of a high school diploma by taking the California High School Proficiency Examination. From there, he can move into community college. But if the child wants to go to a four-year university, homeschooling can get tricky. Most universities require students to take certain subjects. A homeschooling parent has to work carefully to make sure to teach what's required, or the child can end up lacking some essential credits.

Sometimes homeschooled kids have a hard time adjusting to an institution like a university. While they may be exposed to other social situations, they don't necessarily learn the rules of school or how to deal with authority. After all, most of them have never sat in a classroom.

"There's no learning about how to navigate a larger institution," says Phillips. "We call it street smarts."

But some parents, like Steve Ramsey, a graphic designer in Novato who homeschools his son, dislike the kind of socializing schools offers. Ramsey pulled his son out of school because he wanted him to experience a wider variety of people.

"I wanted him to have a better social experience than he gets in school," he says. "Sitting in a room with 30 other kids exactly the same age, you don't interact with other ages or other adults.... It's nothing like real life at all."

These days, homeschoolers have group field trips, classes and online communities throughout the Bay Area. There are also community colleges, tutors and online classes available to them. It's this variety, and the choices it implies, that appeals to so many parents.

"Homeschooling is no better or worse than anything else," says Markwick. "I would encourage people to sit down with their family, really look at their goals and see where it leads you. If it points to homeschooling, jump in. It's just a matter of what is best for your family. And that's pretty much how it is for most people, homeschoolers or not."