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Scott Eisen/Getty Images |
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Homeschool for as Long as You Can |
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By Roger Simon |
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This column’s headline—“hed” in journalistic parlance—could have have been crafted as “Homeschool for as Long as You Can, but if and When You Can’t or When That’s Over, Do Everything Possible to Avoid Government Indoctrination of Your Children at All Costs, Including the Ivy League,” but it seemed a bit lengthy. Nevertheless, that’s what sprung to mind when a friend of mine texted an article from Yahoo Finance with a hed that seemed out of Mad Magazine from my youth or today’s Babylon Bee: “Harvard University Encourages Students to Go on Food Stamps, Even Though It's the Richest School in The World With a $53 Billion Endowment” This was aimed primarily at graduate students who are seeking a minimum of $60,000 per annum for their work. Currently, the minimum is $40,000. Needless to say, on interest alone, Harvard could probably feed everyone in its home city of Cambridge, Massachusetts, seven days a week with truffles and caviar on Sundays without putting much of a dent, if any, in its net worth. The other Ivies aren't quite as rich, but they aren't suffering. What’s actually going on here is yet another example of how our schools are abandoning education for social engineering. Consciously or unconsciously—the two have probably blended—they are teaching their students to rely on the state. Mother government is there to take care of you, even those of you who are highly educated, such as Harvard students. Forget self-reliance. Use food stamps—it’s your right. And it’s simple and fast. (That’s why, these days, they call it the SNAP program.) Even after you get your Ph.D., you can stay on food stamps, not to mention many other wonderful government programs that will be available to you. This educational road-to-socialism, as many of us now realize, doesn't suddenly appear in college or grad school. It begins in kindergarten, now mixed in with all manner of post-Frankfurt School claptrap such as critical race theory and critical gender theory. Educational reformer John Dewey also did his part decades ago so that that you may now get such a thing as a “doctorate” in education. None of this adds to knowledge, but that's more than likely the point. It’s cradle to grave indoctrination. Education, once our country’s glory, has been headed downwards for years. Even average IQs are lower. Given that we spend more per student than almost every other country makes this all the more of a disgrace. (HINT: Money has little or nothing to do with education.) |
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Also, needless to say, everything has gotten worse in the era of “woke.” “Woke” is educational cancer. The most important thing we can do for our country and ourselves, and ultimately even more important than electing a decent president, is to retrieve actual education by taking it in our own hands. Alternative institutions are sprouting up around our country—constitutional schools, classical education schools, parochial schools, and so forth. Use them, but, as we used to say, look before you leap. In Ronald Reagan’s words, “trust, but verify.” Unfortunately, some have been woke-infected. The best of all possible worlds, although unfortunately not accessible to all for a variety of reasons, is now homeschooling. I was initially skeptical, but some of the early caveats, including worries about children's social development due to their isolation from each other, have been assuaged by families organizing into teams and teaching in groups. Equally importantly, with actual working family members and friends pitching in, more expertise is often being imparted than by teachers who have spent much of their time in banal accreditation programs. What we are witnessing is potentially a revolution in education, abjuring overweening government programs such as Common Core in favor of the face-to-face tradition that gave us people such as Abraham Lincoln. This movement is still small, but we can all take part in it. I would imagine numerous readers of The Epoch Times have considerable knowledge to impart to young people that stems from years of working experience. Education undoubtedly began in that manner: an older person teaching a skill to a younger one. Even in some Western countries today, notably Germany, the apprentice system is in heavy use, particularly for the trades. We seem to think everybody must go to college. This is nonsense. College is often a complete waste of time and money. Young people should learn to support themselves in a fulfilling and honorable way. Sometimes, this involves college as we know it, especially in the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) disciplines, but often it's overrated. Even in the arts, this is so. You don’t have to go to college to write the Great American Novel. F. Scott Fitzgerald was kicked out of Princeton; Ernest Hemingway never went to college. Of course, these were people of genius and not particularly fair examples, but they should serve as illustrations that we all have choices. If you’re planning on going to Harvard—or sending your son or daughter there—be sure to tell them that they don’t really need food stamps. They can work and make it on their own. And they’ll feel better about themselves because they have. |
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