Homeschool Childhood Dumping

[MineralMan]

I used to volunteer one afternoon a week at my local library in a small town in California. For four hours, I shelved books, worked at the checkout counter, and did whatever else I was asked to do. I often also helped schoolchildren find books they were looking for. It was fun, and I enjoyed doing that for the five years I volunteered.

One thing I didn't enjoy, though, was seeing children who were supposedly home schooled being dumped at the library all day while their parents were at work. There were a half dozen or so every time I went there as a volunteer or a patron. I asked one of the full-time librarians about it and she told me that all of them were brought into the library when it opened and picked up late in the afternoon. Every day of the week.

That was their homeschooling. The library. Well, the librarians tried to direct the kids to materials suitable for their age, and I tried to help them find information when I could. They had no lunch. They had no breaks. They were just dumped at the library to fend for themselves.

They were there when I first started volunteering and the same kids were there five years later when I had to give up that time for work responsibilities.

I guess there are worse places to dump children, but they were still dumped.

[janterry]

1. I wanted to leave my then 14

year old at the library for an hour while she took an online homeschool test (on her own computer)
and was told that I could not leave her. She had a phone,and I really wasn't going anywhere - I was just going to sit outside and knit.
Plus, I checked in with the librarian so that she would know that I was responsive and responsible.

I guess it depends on the library. TBH, I was irritated. I thought I was being really responsible.

[MineralMan]

4. That sure wasn't the case at the library where I was.

After school, the library literally filled up with kids when school got out. From grammar school to middle school, they poured in. That was the best time to be there, since there was plenty to do. I got lots of requests from kids to find books for some school assignment. I took a little time to help them learn the Dewey Decimal system so they'd get better at finding stuff for themselves. The middle school kids spent a lot of time giggling in the stacks. From where they were, I could guess what books they were giggling at sometimes.

There was one book in the library that dated back to the 1940s. Its title was "Gay parties for all occasions." That was a common giggle area, as were the books on reproduction and childbearing. It was a fun place to work.

But, nobody ever said that parents couldn't drop their kids off at the library.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

2. It's crazy

how loosely home schooling is. Now, I'm not saying that every home schooling situation is the same or bad or abusive, but if parents are going to take it upon themselves to school their children themselves, there should be *some* kind of minimal regulations to a.)Ensure that parents are capable of doing it themselves and have appropriate reasons for doing it (i.e. not using it to avoid having to parent and sending their kids to school) and b.)Children are actually completing some kind of reasonable educational curriculum and, well, learning the basics.

[janterry]

3. Many parents unschool

(just saying

[MineralMan]

5. Yup, that group of kids was definitely unschooled. They were well-behaved, though,

and could read, so I suppose they learned some stuff on their own.

[moriah]

6. Heck, I got threatened with violating the daytime curfew...

...for riding the public bus to study for our distance learning science class with another homeschool friend.

It was offered through the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, and we were both more advanced at science than our moms, so they went in for the course materials together.

There were reasons I was honeschooled, and I found out I wasn't the only child in our district continuously attacked by bullies with them either doing nothing or punishing the victims. I only had concussions, a broken ulna, and multiple pairs of glasses broken, but another girl who stayed in our district was pushed down the stairs and broke both bones in her lower leg... then expelled for it. (My friend's mom was homeschooling because his school's academics were lacking and they had been on a waiting list to transfer to a magnet school for ages with no luck).

I also helped tutor a kid whose family lived so far out that he was spending nearly 4 hours a day on the school bus before homeschooling. He decided after a year he'd rather deal with the bus than the rigorous academics his mom insisted on, and missed friends. His mom put him right back in school -- it'd been about what he wanted and the fact it seemed ridiculous to her that he had to spend so much time in transport, not zealotry, that made her homeschool.

So no, I'm not 100% against homeschooling. For some kids, it's the right move.

But I do think that there need to be some safeguards in place. When I was homeschooled, we at least had to show up once a year to be tested. Most states don't require that anymore, including mine. If a person had disabilities, there was extra scrutiny on the proposed curriculum -- now there are no requirements for people to actually demonstrate they're educating vs warehousing/neglecting their disabled children in most states, either.

And I do think a child should have the right to say they want to go to public school, at least starting at 9th grade. It's very difficult to earn a true diploma in many forns of homeschooling, and teenage children who want to go to college should be allowed to choose public school if that's their preference.

[MineralMan]

7. Of course. There are some people who homeschool very well.

I'm not making a blanket condemnation at all. There are others, though, who don't. Those bother me a lot. Seeing those same kids every week was depressing. The library staff and volunteers did what they could to guide the kids by finding materials for them that would at least give them a chance to learn what was appropriate for their age, but that's no substitute for teachers.

Throughout my public school years, I was always way ahead of my grade level. Fortunately, my small town teachers recognized that and sort of let me proceed on my own at whatever pace I chose. I was an almost daily patron of the local library after school, and read voraciously on a very wide range of subjects.

In those days and in that small town, there was no program designed for kids like me. So, I learned whatever I wanted to learn, while passing all the tests, etc. that were part of the regular school agenda. By the time I was out of high school, I tested out of most of the freshman classes at the college I went to, basically skipping a year then.

School wasn't boring to me, but it wasn't challenging, so I just kept learning more, with the encouragement of my parents. I some ways, I was unschooled, even though I had perfect attendance at school. I just wasn't studying what the other kids in my classes were studying. I was off on a wild adventure of learning, and nobody was bothered about that. They just let me go and learn.

[moriah]

10. I'm actually thinking of the Erica Parsons case, where they were able to warehouse...

... the mentally disabled (from facial features and history, suggestive of FAS) child of a family member they adopted, then abused for years, ending in her death from "homicidal violence" showing multiple healed fractures -- and her "parents" had her on the rolls at "Parsons Christian School" in Rowan County, NC, and collected benefits on her for over a year after she died.

Particularly vulnerable children must be protected in homeschooling environments, and in her case since it was a relative adoption there was probably little to no home study or follow-up done like there would have been had she been officially "in the system".

And if in many states you can hide a child for years from authorities because they never even have to go through standardized testing.... that makes people decide to abuse what can be a good educational solution for *some* children to abuse, neglect, and/or brainwash their kids to believe things like that the earth is flat (seriously, having a child ask you if you heard about the "fake eclipse" is disturbing on many levels).

[janterry]

8. The Supreme Court Case ruling on this was from the Amish

and they allowed the parents to take their kids out of school at 8th grade-- Because of 'religious' liberty.

I have always opposed that. A limited education ensures they stay Amish (not that there is anything wrong with being Amish), but it limits the kids who grow up and - if they want to leave - almost can't -
they get out there with a very limited education and if they want to catch up - they have a LOT of work to do.

[KT2000]

9. some of it amounts to child abuse

I know there are many who take homeschooling seriously and truly educate their kids. My two encounters with homeschooled kids was not like that though.
One woman used her daughter as her pal to take along on her daily errands etc. That was more important than the schooling. That young lady (now) was cheated out of a decent education.
Another "student" was the child of two mentally unstable parents. The father would tell anyone who would listen that he worked for the CIA - and what he was working on. The mother shared his delusions. This was another child who was cheated out of a good education.
In both cases, the girls appeared to be depressed.

To protect the children there needs to be greater oversight. To deny children an education they will need for the future amounts to child abuse in my book.

[Ilsa]

11. I think if I worked at the library,

I would ask the parents to sign a release stating that they understand that staff would not be responsible for anything that happened to their children, including injury, predatory behavior from other patrons, feeding them, making certain they had not left the facility, making certain they were looking only at age-appropriate materials, etc. I would include the fact that if the child was found unconscious (even asleep), 911 would be called for an ambulance, which they would be responsible for payment.

I would hope the parents would get the crap scared out of them, thinking about their kid being left alone.

[lindysalsagal]

12. I'd call child protective services. That's neglect and abandonment.

Public schools are free, for goodness sake.

[ThoughtCriminal]

13. I think I know how you can stop this practice

Start handing the kids books about critical thinking, science, evolution, labor union and civil rights history. You know - KNOWLEDGE.

Once the parents find out, they won't let them near the place.

[MineralMan]

14. Well, I was a little subversive that way

with those kids, but couldn't really go very far with getting to know them. About all I could do was hand them a book and say I thought they might like it. The library staff all sort of adopted those kids. We discussed how to help them without causing alarm from their parents.