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  • AN INTERESTING STAT

    Filed at 6:11 pm under by dcobranchi

    I find this one hard to believe:

    The greatest change from 2003 was an 11 point increase in the desire to provide religious and moral instruction which went from 72% in 2003 to 83% in 2007.

    Homeschoolers have become more religious over the last 4 years? That just doesn’t feel right.

    8 Responses to “AN INTERESTING STAT”


    Comment by
    speedwell
    January 6th, 2009
    at 10:56 pm

    It’s a hard question to answer. I would have answered that I want to teach my children my moral standards rather than the school’s, even though I’m not a bit religious.


    Comment by
    Alasandra
    January 7th, 2009
    at 7:15 am

    I wonder how they came up with that stat. Many times polls are worded in such a way as to make one answer the favored one. One of the things we learned in marketing was how to create a poll to get the answer we wanted. While not everyone will pick the desired answer the majority of people do.

    It was actually a very interesting study.


    Comment by
    COD
    January 7th, 2009
    at 10:09 am

    Here is the actual survey report if anybody wants to figure out how HSLDA is massaging the numbers to get the press release they want.
    nces.e...009030


    Comment by
    JJ Ross
    January 7th, 2009
    at 10:17 am

    Hmmm, but religion among all Americans ticked up after the 9-11 attacks, so it would be a thinking error to imagine it has anything to do with “homeschoolers” as some distinct group:

    PEW FORUM/Pew Research Center — The Sept. 11 attacks have increased the prominence of religion in the United States to an extraordinary degree. . .

    Probably as wars go on and now with the global economic meltdown, religion as refuge continues to appeal?

    Also world historian Jacques Barzun in his 500-year tome, From Dawn to Decadence, demonstrated that’s it’s a macro cycle, not any sort of permanent trend that means anything. He saw “primitive religion” cycles up and down every generation or so, with or without catastrophically frightening events as causal.


    Comment by
    Daryl Cobranchi
    January 7th, 2009
    at 10:21 am

    “In the 2003 and 2007 NHES, parents were asked whether
    particular reasons for homeschooling their children applied
    to them. The three reasons selected by parents of more
    than two-thirds of students were concern about the school
    environment, to provide religious or moral instruction, and
    dissatisfaction with the academic instruction available at
    other schools (figure 2). From 2003 to 2007, the percentage
    of students whose parents reported homeschooling to
    provide religious or moral instruction increased from
    72 percent to 83 percent.”


    Comment by
    COD
    January 7th, 2009
    at 11:38 am

    “Religious or moral”

    How do you homeschool without providing moral instruction?


    Comment by
    Rob
    January 7th, 2009
    at 6:16 pm

    I have no clue who is joining the club in greater numbers. I personally haven’t converted anyone to the cause of homeschooling, secular or religious. The standard reaction I get from both church folk and godless co-workers alike, is a wistful sad look and mumbling something about how they could never homeschool because they’d be bad at it.


    Comment by
    JJ Ross
    January 8th, 2009
    at 10:42 am

    Another interesting stat – two percent.

    According to Saddleback Pastor Rick Warren, two percent (the usual estimate of home educated, btw) is a threatening minority we mustn’t allow to change America, so its civil rights must be legislated away by the godly majority, to keep the culture normal and healthy and moral . . .