A recent lead article in the Sunday magazine "USA Weekend" asked boldly, "Is homeschooling good for America?". Nationally, homeschooling is a rapidly growing, if controversial, movement. Some estimates now say that there are more students being homeschooled in America than are being educated in any single public school district, except the very largest of those public districts. At the risk of being utterly impertinent, based on the dismal test results achieved by the largest of public school systems, one could conceivably argue that more students are being educated at home than are being truly educated in the schools of the largest public districts. Yet, the critics of homeschooling, such as the National Educational Association, continue to work towards their stated goal of eroding parents' rights to educate their children at home. The recent "USA Weekend" article failed to do adequate justice to their important cover story question. Homeschooling is good for America.

        Critics allege that parents who choose to homeschool their children are preventing the children from acquiring the necessary social skills. This contention is not supported by the clinical research. John Wesley Taylor, Ph.D., in his 1986 dissertation, Self-Confidence in Home-Schooling Children, reported in a blind study of both homeschooled and public schooled children that the homeschooled children scored significantly higher on the Piers-Harris Children's Self-Concept Scale than did their public schooled counterparts. Piers-Harris is a widely accepted measure of self-esteem, that highly praised indicator of socialization. Larry Edward Shyers, Ph.D., reported in his 1992 dissertation, Comparison of Social Adjustment Between Home and Traditionally Schooled Students , that homeschooled children display fewer problem behaviors than their public schooled counterparts when playing with mixed groups of children from both educational backgrounds. Shyers report was based on blind observation by trained observers. His measurements were based on the Child Observation Checklist's Direct Observation Form. Shyers concluded that his data supports the hypothesis that contact with adults, rather than contact with children, is most important in the developing of social skills in children. Other researchers concur with these conclusions. Among them are M.M. Delahooke, in a 1986 doctoral dissertation, Home educated children's social/emotional adjustment and academic achievement: a comparative study and L. Montgomery, in the study,The effect of home schooling on the leadership skills of home schooled students . Looking at the research, the critics' contention that homeschooling impairs the socialization of children is clearly unfounded.

        The critics next assault on homeschooling is usually to question the ability of parents to educate their own children. The professional educators would have us believe the blatantly untrue statement that it takes a Bachelor's degree in education and state certification as a teacher to be able to impart knowledge. The vast majority of college lecturers, instructors, and professors have had little or no formal training in education. That homeschooling parents are more than adequately able to instruct their own children is proven out by the fact that homeschoolers, on average, consistently outperform their public school counterparts on standardized tests by at least thirty percentile points. Additionally, research by Brian Ray, A Nationwide Study of Home Education: Family Characteristics, Legal Matters, and Student Achievement, J. Rakestraw,An Analysis of Home Schooling for Elementary School-age Children in Alabama, N. Tizard and M. Hughes, Young Children Learning, and J. Wartes, The relationship of Selected Input Variables to Academic Achievement Among Washington's Homeschoolers, adequately demonstrated that parents are well capable of providing instruction to their own children. So, not only are homeschooled children better prepared socially than public school students, homeschooled children are better prepared academically than their public school counterparts.

        Finally, many critics of homeschooling would have the public to believe that homeschooling parents are incapable of giving their children the broad worldview which they deem necessary for success in a pluralistic society. On that, the critics may be correct, after a fashion. John Dewey, one of the "fathers" of modern education, believed that education should be used to change and channel thinking towards the goals of society. The much praised Goals 2000 program seems more concerned with political correctness than with true academic achievement. For most Christian homeschooling parents, the overall goal for education is to produce children who, in the words of the Baltimore Catechism, "know, love, and serve God, in this world, so that" they "may be happy with Him in the next." There is a major difference in the mindsets of the professional educator who seeks to conform children to the standards of this world and the homeschooling parent who seeks to train up his/her children in the knowledge and love of God so that his/her children may be instrumental in the work of conforming the world to Christ. There is no reconciliation possible between these two dynamically opposed views of the true purpose of education.

        The future of America rests on securely its' childrens' shoulders. What could be a better assurance of America's bright future than a generation of children who are not only academically prepared to be leaders for the next century, but who are also both spiritually and socially sound and secure? This is the great treasure that homeschooling offers. The outstanding caliber of young adults produced by homeschools is why homeschooling is good for America.

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