<p>Perhaps others would like to weigh in on this subject. The poster is bothered by the lack of "quality control" in homeschooling and doesn't see what will stop homeschoolers from simply claiming they are high school graduates and coming up with bogus transcripts.</p>
<p>Read through what all has been said so far before coming in. </p>
<p>Thanks. I just irks me that people assume we need to have government looking over us to make sure we do the best for our kids.</p>
<p>In the end it's what the Deans of Admission think, and the kind of adults our kids turn out to be.</p>
<p>The forum should be used to support others who are thinking of or are in the process of home schooling. I really think it would be better to ignore some of the immature posts unless there is an opportunity to educate one on the advantages for some by home schooling.</p>
<p>In our case one of the greatest confirmations was from a assistant superintendent who actually stated my son was getting a better education at home then what the district would have provided.
He even humbly apologized for "failing us".
That was very touching and sincere:)</p>
<p>Some of the colleges on my daughter's list want to see our registration letter with our county in Virginia to show that, yes, she's a registered homeschooler. That would prevent such an incident as you described from occurring. (Not sure what homeschoolers who live in states that don't require registration would do).</p>
<p>As far as 'justifying transcripts', the admissions officers that I spoke with said that they look at the SAT scores and use that to weigh the grades. For instance, if my daughter has a 4.0 average and a 1300+ on her SATs, then they know, "Yes...these grades are reliable". If she has a 4.0 and a 1000 on her SATs, then they're going to question her grades.</p>
<p>On a personal note, I'm surprised at the hostility toward homeschoolers that I've found on this message board from non-homeschoolers! I wouldn't go over to the "regular" board and bash public schoolers. I'm inclined to believe that this is one of the reasons why so few homeschoolers post here. </p>
<p>When my son went through the admissions nightmare this site gave us advice that really was priceless. My wife posts on the yahoo boards and that helped with transcript advice and putting his app together.
CC was wonderful for college choices and general support.
Northstarmom for advice on how to strengthen his essay writing, Sybbie for fin-aid ,and Andi for general encouragement.
As far as hostel posters go, my advice is to not let them distract you by answering them in the first place. It is better to ask to have the post removed and often your wish will be granted.
This site is truly an indispensable tool for college admissions.</p>
<p>The hostility is remarkable, but things are improving as more homeschoolers join the discussion. The such-a-joke thread will probably keep surfacing, but seems to be winding down a bit. </p>
<p>Homeschooling is still a foreign, controversial, and threatening concept for a lot of people. Whether it's jealousy, guilt, ignorance, or genuine concern for students' wellbeing, it pushes buttons and will continue to do so for a long time. </p>
<p>It's easy to get discouraged by the trolls, but this forum is important. I certainly appreciate the persistence people have shown here, and believe it has real impact on homeschoolers' lives.</p>
<p>The thing is, the post I was responding to wasn't from a troll or an immature comment. It was someone doubting the reliability of homeschool transcripts without "quality control" from some agency or other. In my years homeschooling, it seems to be a persistent attitude when talking to people. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has fielded questions like, "Who determines your curriculum," "Who gives you your books," "Who checks to make sure your child is learning," etc. I responded because I thought I had a chance of educating the poster and others that might read the exchange.</p>
<p>The discussion has gone between college admissions. It is dealing with jobs that require a high school diploma -- the question being why couldn't high school dropouts just call themselves a homeschool graduate?</p>
<p>Well, looking at a new post, the discussion on the other board may be over at this point. My attempts to explain things weren't getting anywhere, but nan came in and managed in her diplomatic way to satisfy that poster.</p>
<p>Diane, I think you brought up a lot of interesting points in your argument in the Parents Forum. In particular, you mentioned it would be interesting to know the relevant percentages of homeschoolers versus other students who need remedial coursework when they get to college.</p>
<p>However, as interesting as that idea is, I don't know how you could frame up a study like that. I never hear anybody talk about how those numbers would be skewed because the homeschooling population contains so many students, whose numbers should count as failing on the schools' records. Students who can't take it in school for whatever reason, move to homeschooling and although many then thrive, it's still a statistically different group than you'd have if you randomly selected students to homeschool.</p>
<p>It's much more likely for a student who is having problems in the classroom to turn to homeschooling, than it is for a student who is successful in school. There are many reasons to homeschool, but a substantial number do so because they were already in need of remedial help and were not getting the help they need in school.</p>
<p>That means any assessment of homeschoolers needing remedial help would have to take into account the ones the school system failed before they turned to homeschooling. </p>
<p>Of course you'd also want to take into consideration the high number of brilliant students who don't need remedial help, but didn't thrive as school because their needs weren't being met either... </p>
<p>Anyway, I wonder how you could frame up a study that would produce reliable an meaningful numbers, taking all that into consideration.</p>
<p>None of that has much to do with the debate mentioned previously or the assessment question. As far as that goes, I think people will continue to be curious, and often critical as long as they are uninformed about the homeschooling process. They are going to keep asking questions, and we'll probably keep answering them.</p>
<p>However, homeschoolers on average do score higher on standardized testing than others. This would indicate either than there is not a higher percentage of those with academic problems in the homeschooled population OR that problems are remediated in the homeschool group prior to testing OR that the homeschooled students with such problems are less likely to be tested than the regularly schooled one with problems. There are probably other possibilities as well! The amount of testing is probably the least likely explanation, as I reason through it, because I would think the factors causing a homeschooler not to test would be the same factors causing a traditionally schooled student not to test, at least for things like the ACT/SAT which usually aren't mandatory.</p>
<p>I mentioned remedial coursework because for graduates of my local school system, which people say in one of the best in the country, a rather large percentage (can't remember the exact figure) need such courses when they go to the local community college. Just anecdotally, I haven't heard of any homeschoolers in the same situation. There seems to be a prejudice against remediation in the school system -- accommodation is so much easier. It seems that if kids don't get certain skills by a particular age, the school system gives up on them.</p>
<p>Another interesting study would be to see if the more argumentative homeschool parents are the ones who left public schools when problems arose, as opposed to those who always homeschooled or left for some other reason!</p>
<p>
[quote]
Another interesting study would be to see if the more argumentative homeschool parents are the ones who left public schools when problems arose, as opposed to those who always homeschooled or left for some other reason!
[/quote]
Ha! This might well be. But when I think about the truly argumentative parents I know, most of them are still in the system. I think they'd wither up and die if they didn't have the school system to duke it out with.</p>
<p>It is very interesting to think about all the ways one could study homeschooling. Maybe it would be good to come up with an online repository of questionnaires or something where data could be gathered and available to anybody who wanted to use it. It would be a great homeschooling tool, if a student wanted to learn about doing research.</p>
<p>Well, I'm not in the system anymore ... but for all you know, I may have been worse when I was! Actually, I think I was ... now I am most argumentative whenever I REMEMBER the school system. Leaving it probably did a world of good for my mental health.</p>
<p>We went with an umbrella school rather than school system review because I figured it was worth several hundred dollars a year not to sit in the same room with the ps people. I figured the cost of tranquilizers (or bail) would end up more than that!</p>
<p>There is a set of research about homeschooling at the HSLDA web site.</p>
<p>A new study someone on another board just mentioned is this:</p>