ABOUT ME
I was asked to write a post giving some history. Predictably, it turned out longer than I intended.
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I am a home educating father (well, a father supportive of my lovely home educating wife). We have four children ages 12 down to almost 5 as of May 2004. You’ve probably seen pictures of them on the site. We’ve been homeschooling since Sept. 11th, 2001. Yes, I recognize the significance of the date. I was on the phone with the Delaware Department of Education requesting the appropriate forms when the first plane hit.
Early on, Lydia (the aforementioned lovely wife) and I decided to split the homeschooling responsibilities along these lines: she would handle the day-to-day “educating” and I would be responsible for the political/protection role. So, I learned as much as I could about Delaware home schooling laws, got active with the Delaware Home Education Association, and (confession time) joined HSLDA. Hey, I was a newbie; that’s what newbies do.
While working with DHEA, I got to know Joey Ashby. Joey was a long-time DE homeschooling stalwart. For years, she had been keeping other DE homeschoolers informed about what has happening in the state and beyond. She regularly scanned the local papers and the legislature’s website for homeschooling-relevant info. She was also getting ready to move out of state. Shortly before leaving for good, she asked if I’d be willing to pick up her “job” and email some folks when I came across anything interesting. That original email distribution list had about 10 folks on it. We called it the DHEA Yankees (because it mostly consisted of DHEA members in the northern part of the state).
I started scanning the local papers and other websites and was finding interesting (to me) stuff every day. I think I started to aggravate some people on the list with the constant emails. Emailing articles turned out to be a problem, too, as everyone had a different email client, and cutting and pasting in a format accessible by everyone was a technical challenge. That’s when I read a brief article about this guy called Instapundit and this new thing called blogging. The light bulb went off. Here was a way I could post some articles and email a link to the distribution list! I signed up on blogspot that day. The blog was http://dheayankees.blogspot.com It’s still there. That first post was made May 9th, 2002. It was pretty primitive blogging- no permalinks, no comments. Still, a vast improvement over the email route. Finally, about a year ago, I got frustrated with constant outages at blogspot and moved to my own domain.
And that’s the history of the blog. Oh, yeah, one other thing. In my other life, I’m a chemist with DuPont.
13 Responses to “ABOUT ME”
Comment by MYSTIC May 29th, 2004 at 4:52 pm |
I have a question: what made you decide to homeschool? It seems as though your oldest children were in the public schools for a short while. What were your views prior to that and what made you change? |
Comment by Daryl Cobranchi May 29th, 2004 at 5:25 pm |
Assumptions, assumptions. 🙂 Actually, the g-schools were never an option. Out two oldest went to a private Christian school for several years. Tuition was running us $10,000 per year (after tax dollars) with two more kids still to come. Homeschooling (at first) was a financial decision more than anything. Now we wouldn’t give it up, even if we hit the lottery. |
Comment by Tim Haas May 29th, 2004 at 8:13 pm |
Daryl isn’t half that serious-looking in real life, folks. |
Comment by Daryl Cobranchi May 29th, 2004 at 10:19 pm |
And I don’t have that much grey hair, do I? |
Comment by J Aron May 30th, 2004 at 12:20 am |
Funny… you don’t look like a chemist.. |
Comment by Laura May 30th, 2004 at 3:25 pm |
And what do chemists look like? More than once I’ve gone into an American Chemical Society meeting where I’ve eyed people in the parking lot, or lobby, and thought they looked like a chemist; and they eyed me back; and finding the meeting rooom, found them there, and they’ve laughed and said, “We recognized each other, didn’t we?” or “I thought I’d see you here!” It may be the kind of look that to other people says “nerd”. I wouldn’t know. |
Comment by J Aron May 30th, 2004 at 5:54 pm |
No – I didn’t mean “Nerd” I meant the “Bill Nye the Science Guy” or “Professor Irwin Corey” look. Kind of wild eyed and crazed look… LOL |
Comment by Laura May 30th, 2004 at 8:06 pm |
Sometimes I’m wild eyed and crazed. With four kids, I’ll bet Daryl is too. |
Comment by Traci May 30th, 2004 at 11:10 pm |
Hey Tim…. “isn’t half that serious-looking in person….” Is that another way of saying funny-looking??? just teasing Daryl… But have you seen him in the black hat??? Now there’s a picture. 🙂 Thanks Daryl for DHEA yankees & now H&OES!!!!! |
Comment by Daryl Cobranchi May 30th, 2004 at 11:24 pm |
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Comment by Traci May 31st, 2004 at 9:11 pm |
Yep that’s the hat!!! But what’s the deal w/ the shades? 🙂 |
Comment by Tim Haas May 31st, 2004 at 9:29 pm |
I didn’t mean to mess with your horse, hombre. I’m backing off, and you can put the Colt down now … |
Comment by Bronson June 9th, 2004 at 11:12 am |
Daryl, Homeschooling father/blogger/scientist. Hmmm… Sounds familiar. I’ve got three kids, we pulled our oldest out of public school a couple weeks ago (post here), and we’ll be homeschooling all of them starting next fall (actually over the summer too). I blog (obviously), and am an engineer (not exactly a scientist), but I’m also a law student. If you’re interested in another chemist’s blog, try arkham...ot.com. He’s a good friend of mine and a co-worker who has a PhD from U.Conn. in Analytical Chem. I’ll be back to see what else you’ve got to say. Regards, |