Rolfe Schmidt

I’m usually pretty cynical about anything that smells like politics. Those few times I’ve heard a politician say something intelligent and earnest, I’ve also heard them belittled as lunatic, uncharismatic, or out of touch with voters. Up to this point in my life, I haven’t let that get me down — I just live under the radar and avoid law and politics.

But now I’ve gone and decided that it is great fun having my kids around, talking and learning with them. I’ve also decided that I don’t want my kids to be ethically servile to the state. Maybe it is because I’m a Christian, maybe it’s because I’m an Anarchist, or maybe it’s just because I’m a normal and happy person. Who knows? But I do know I’ve decided to homeschool and I love it. Read some of my other posts, particularly those linked on my Math for Young Kids page for a taste of why I love it. 

Suddenly I realize that homeschooling isn’t a good path to follow if you want to avoid politics. I see swarms of people trying to restrict my ability to raise my kids the way I want to “for the good of society”. The arguments are usually inane, and the arguers seem completely uninterested in truth. It seems to be all about scoring political points on your rivals. And the proposals that get thrown out — usually some sort of registration and testing — would have a much bigger impact on me than on the fundamentalists that are supposedly the big problem.

We have friends and neighbors that are fundamentalist Christian homeschoolers. Unlike the characters in some stories certain law professors make up, they teach their daughters to read very well and don’t seem to be nearly as sheltering as many believe. All of them use curricula and homeschool in a very structured way. Some of them already pay their own money for their kids to take standardized tests. Registration and testing would be irrelevant for these people. And good luck getting those parents to really teach their kids your values. They will teach them about your values alright. They will pass any test you give them, but you will not get what you were looking for.

My situation is different.  I have no intention of using a curriculum, or making sure my kids have any particular skills at any particular time, or that they learn to answer questions the way someone else thinks they should be answered. The restrictions people talk about would have a big impact on me. I would need to start worrying about tests and timetables or risk losing the right to teach my kids at home. From what I can tell, most people like me — the people who will be most restrained by regulation —  are certainly not fundamentalists of any sort, and many fall somewhere left of acceptable in American politics.

All this leaves me with a feeling of helplessness at the hands of the state. That and the constant explaining about why we’re not sending our kids to school are the two things I like least about our decision to homeschool.

But here is something that cheers me up. Cocking a Snook had a couple of posts on these issues yesterday and pointed to a great discussion of the political side of homeschooling. I’ve only made it halfway through, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a careful, truth-seeking, and rational discussion about any sort of politics before. Much less on the internet. Yes, it is a group of people with common goals. But they don’t all agree and they aren’t just patting themselves on the back. They are thinking.

I have a lot to learn. I am realizing that so many of the rough thoughts I’ve been having have been thought before, and argued, and refined. By thinking people. I am so happy to see thinking, truth-seeking people, even when they disagree with me! So I think I’ll be reading more and talking less for a little while when it comes to politics. I have a lot of other things I want to write about anyway…