Why We Homeschool

I discovered John Holt one day in 9^th grade when I’d cut classes and gone to the local library instead. Despite my misery in school, I was interested in education and spent a lot of time in the 360’s at the library. Essentially, I cut school in order to research school, and learned that there was something better than school. The real epiphany for me though, was that not all adults shared the ‘get good grades, behave yourself, go to college, and get a good job’ philosophy of life that was imposed on me, and everyone I knew, relentlessly and with the best of intentions. I discovered John Holt, and my life changed. No, I didn’t convince my parents to let me leave school and learn on my own, but I did gain enough confidence in my own reality to advocate successfully for more autonomy. My parents stipulated only that I keep my grades up and maintain my health, and my daytime hours at least were my own.

Keeping my grades up required that I attend a stipulated number of school days each quarter (I forget how many) but my parents were willing to write ‘absence notes’ for me, and to overlook it when I occasionally got caught cutting individual classes. I’m grateful for their forbearance, and don’t blame them for their insistence that I still follow the college path – neither of them received any encouragement to excel in school, and my father’s family were downright discouraging. They were dissatisfied, convinced that they’d ‘missed the boat’ and that their future was inescapably grim. They wanted better for my sister and me. I did go to college – a friend invited me along at the last minute to visit a small state school with an excellent reputation, and I liked it well enough to apply. I was confident that I’d be accepted – I had great SAT scores and fair grades, but I was ambivalent about actually enrolling.

I got accepted and, because my expected family contribution was nil, I got a tidy financial-aid package. That most of the money was in the form of loans didn’t bother me at the time – here was a chance to live away from home and get that degree that would inoculate me against failure and poverty. My college work was inconsistent – I got A’s in course I liked, C’s and D’s in courses I didn’t. I graduated, just barely, and with a baby in my belly and a soon-to-be husband. My feminist friends dropped me, and my husband and I were plunged into relative poverty despite my degree. For a time I was adamantly opposed to formal schooling at all, for anyone who didn’t have a very specific career path in mind. I’ve softened my stance on that, and have come to see self-directed learning as absolutely essential to everyone, and as valuable and worthwhile as formal schooling. I homeschool my children less to avoid the ugliness of K-12 socialization and more because we’re just happy as we are, learning at home in freedom and love.