{"id":62732,"date":"2026-02-06T11:21:40","date_gmt":"2026-02-06T16:21:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=62732"},"modified":"2026-02-06T11:21:40","modified_gmt":"2026-02-06T16:21:40","slug":"the-case-for-homeschools-part-i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=62732","title":{"rendered":"The Case for Homeschools Part I\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

Author:\u00a0 R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D.\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Since the recent week of Jan 25-31, 2026, was National School Choice Week, it is an appropriate time to address the status of homeschools in North Carolina. The number of children being taught at home has now reached almost 200,000 students in North Carolina, which is more than the number of students attending private schools, which is about 130,000. These numbers are considerably less than the 1.5 million students in public schools, although this number decreased by about 20,000 in the past year. Let\u2019s take a look at why parents decide to make the significant commitment to homeschool their children. By the way, homeschooling is not a new idea. Actually, mandatory attendance at public schools in North Carolina was first passed by the N.C. General Assembly in 1915. Many, if not most, of the prior generations (including the Founding Fathers) were homeschooled.<\/p>\n

The reason parents choose to homeschool depends on individual circumstances and concerns. Declining public school performance in teaching basic academic skills such as reading, writing, math, and science is a significant factor in choosing to homeschool. According to recent data, 51% of eighth graders in public schools are proficient in reading, 46% in math, and 70% in science. Homeschooled children typically perform at 15-30 percentage points higher than public school students. They also achieve an 87% acceptance rate to college compared to 68% for public schoolers. Another important reason for parents to homeschool is dissatisfaction with the leftist leaning curriculum in most public schools. Legitimate concerns such as instruction in racial issues such as Diversity\/Equity and Inclusion; so-called social justice which teaches the Marxist principle that all people deserve the same benefits in life regardless of their individual effort and hard work; teaching that gender is the choice of the individual instead of being determined by one\u2019s biological nature; and the notion that\u00a0 government exists to provide the basic needs of life instead of individual responsibility are motivating parents to choose homeschools. According to a recent PEW research poll, the majority of teachers and school administrators are in lock step with the Democrat Party while only 36% favor the Republican Party. It should be remembered that all authoritarian governments use their control of public education to enhance their political power through indoctrination of students. The lack of school discipline weighs heavily on the decision to homeschool one\u2019s children just as it is a major reason why teachers leave the profession. Not having to worry about a child\u2019s safety and not being exposed to unruly, antisocial behavior from other students is a relief for homeschooling parents.<\/p>\n

There are also many advantages to homeschooling. One advantage is that it fosters the integrity of the family. The time spent with children is invaluable to ensuring that they model the values and behavior of their parents. Homeschooling also ensures that the parents keep well informed about their children\u2019s academic progress. The educational process is continuous in various family activities that provide an opportunity to teach; rather than only in specific places and times. Parents can pursue activities that reflect a particular child\u2019s interests so that learning is an element of living–not just formal instruction, which of course has its place as well. Vacations and travel provide additional opportunities to incorporate learning activities. All educators believe that class size is an important element in effective learning as is verified by ongoing efforts to reduce class size in public schools. In the 1950\u2019s typical class size was 30 to 35 students per teacher. Now across the U.S. the ratio of student to teacher is 15 to 1. Homeschooling obviously provides the lowest teacher to student ratio and thus more individual attention. This allows the parent teacher to utilize traditional learning activities instead of relying on electronic gadgets that in many ways are antithetical to the development of student\u2019s ability to think and analyze on their own. How does a public-school teacher know if an essay supposedly written by the student is not some product of AI? Well, in most cases they cannot tell.<\/p>\n

While homeschooling is not a viable choice for everyone, it does provide freedom of choice and bonding of the nuclear family that should be recognized. Part II of this article will address some of the practical aspects of ensuring that parents retain the freedom to choose how their children are educated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Author:\u00a0 R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D.\u00a0\u00a0 Since the recent week of Jan 25-31, 2026, was National School Choice Week, it is an appropriate time to address the status of homeschools in North Carolina. The number of children being taught at home … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[19117,8170],"class_list":["post-62732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-alan-harroop","tag-homeschooling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=62732"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62732\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62733,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62732\/revisions\/62733"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=62732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=62732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=62732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}