EXODUS MANDATE-WV

WHAT ABOUT VIRTUAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS?

School at Home or Homeschooling?

August 7, 2012

Dave Bohon

As homeschooling gained widespread popularity throughout the 1990s, the public-education establishment found it increasingly difficult to stop the exodus of families seeking something better for their children. But with the introduction of online learning in the late 1990s, a core of education “entrepreneurs” suggested that, using the charter-school concept, public schools might just offer their own version of homeschooling that would allow students to fulfill all the requirements set by a district — but instead of going to a classroom they could use an online curriculum.

The families that sign on to these public-school virtual academies get “free homeschooling” for their kids — which typically includes “free” computers and other perks — while the school district retains the per-student monies it would have lost had those families gone with another homeschool option. It all sounds like a win-win scenario, right?

Wrong! Companies like K12 and Connections Academy have exerted great effort to convince the public that they are providing a quality homeschool option through public schools.

But homeschool experts point out that these public-school virtual academies have little in common with traditional homeschooling…in the virtual academy model, “the state chooses and controls the curriculum — that which is used to teach, train, and indoctrinate the student.”

While K12 boasts that online public school offers “powerful choices for parents,” and other virtual academies insist that their curricula give parents and students flexibility, a majority of those “choices” and flexibility are lost when it comes to one important element that has always been essential to a majority of homeschool parents: Christian instruction. e.

The Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), the leading organization defending the rights of homeschool families, has strongly cautioned parents against enrolling their children in virtual charter schools.

http://www.thenewamerican.com/culture/education/item/12335-school-at-home-or-homeschooling??tmpl=component&print=1

Also see How Would People Pay for Private Schooling? What about Vouchers? and Why Christian Education Is Important.

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