Usually I find something interesting, and today was no different. I would NEVER wallow into comments though, so it will be here that I make my comment.
Amanda Marcotte is venturing into the subject of home schooling. She read an article about it and everything(!); an interview with the president of the National Home Educator's Nework, Laura Derrick.
I didn’t expect the interviewer to hammer at Derrick about the issue of whether or not it’s wise for people to homeschool their kids if they are doing so with the intention of teaching them that Noah had a pet dinosaur or that Jesus founded America (and therefore feed them into upper echelon jobs in the Justice Department), but I figured it would at least come up. No luck, though.
There it is; that is the reason those of a religious persuasion home school. But, Marcotte does make an exception for the motives of left-leaning parents who homeschool:
None of that is to say that I think that all homeschoolers are fundie nuts intent on depriving their kids of a reality-based education. I’m quite aware that the concept of homeschooling is gaining some steam on the left, because it seems like it’s a good way to resist the problems with the public school system, particularly the issues of how the system prizes teaching compliant behavior over actual education, often to the point where one begins to think that kids are actually meant to get stupider in school.
Rightwingers homeschool to teach their children that Noah killed the dinasours, while left-leaning parents do so because they wish to put education over compliant behavior.
But, her main beef with homeschooling is that it means that women are stuck with doing more work for free.
. I honestly admire any woman who has the brains and energy to homeschool, make no mistake. But it’s frustrating to me that it goes without question so often that mothers are obligated to turn those brains and energy over to their children, keeping nothing for themselves, and not even getting that (meager) paycheck at the end of the day that professional teachers receive.
So, is life all about a paycheck? Too many feminists equate happiness and fulfillment in life with a nice salary.
Earlier in the article, Marcotte complains that the "social aspects of high school are based around reinforcing materialism", yet she complains that there is not material (cash) benefits for a mom who teachers her children? The benefits of homeschooling are definitely not material.
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