HOMESCHOOLING != DROPPING OUT
When people who care enough about high school dropouts to study the problem cite wildly differing figures as the local dropout rate, it’s clear that their most urgent need is for reliable information.
[snip]
Dropping out at the legal age is not, after all, an unlawful act for which anyone can compelled to account.
Not every student will cooperate. Not every parent will be accessible. Parents who decide to home-school may feel little compulsion to help the school system work on its problem.
*sigh*
3 Responses to “HOMESCHOOLING != DROPPING OUT”
 Comment by Spunky November 10th, 2008 at 11:08 pm |
This has been going on for years. When the superintendant of public instruction mentioned the higher drop out rate in a public forum, I challenged him on the defintion of “drop out.” He admitted it had been revised to include many that were once in public schools but were not unaccounted for but still residing in the state. Homeschoolers have no statutory accountability and would obviously be in that category. A few years ago, I posted about the valedictorian of a Texas high school who was considered a “drop out” because she refused to take the Texas high school exam. Everyone inlcuding her parents said she was making a mistake because she wouldn’t be able to get into any college. Standing on princple the girl stuck to her guns and was considered by Texas to be a drop out. She ended up getting scholarships to many univiersities because of the publicity and her willingness to stand up against instrusive state regulation and testing of students. A new day is dawning and more of this garbage is on the horizon. |
 Comment by Nance Confer November 11th, 2008 at 8:28 am |
The swing in the number of dropouts depends on who is doing the counting and is far greater than the hsing population. All such numbers could be published with a +/- 2% margin of error to account for hsers and still be way off. Nance |
 Comment by Charity November 11th, 2008 at 8:51 am |
The wording is clunky, but I think the point is that the feedback from parents who take their kids out of school in order to homeschool can be beneficial in helping the schools identify their problems. I agree with that. I have a lot of criticisms of the school that my children went to before I discovered homeschooling. I am sure that it would be beneficial for the school to know about some of the issues I had. I doubt they want the feedback, though. I have no intention of sending my children back to school, no matter how the school changes. I wonder if homeschoolers are counted as dropouts here in Vermont. I doubt it because homeschooling is listed in all education statutes as one of the three schooling options: public schools, independent schools, and home study programs (which is fancy edu-speak for homeschool). |