THE REVOLUTION IS HERE AND IT IS NOW: “Note to Policymakers: Homeschooling is Here to Stay.”
Homeschooling is here to stay and the time has come for policymakers to acknowledge that fact. After years of increasing at a rate of about 3 percent a year, the number of parents choosing to homeschool their children has spiked, triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the portion of children being homeschooled doubled from 5.4 percent during the 2019-20 school year to 11 percent in 2020-21. Among Black families, homeschooling jumped nearly five-fold during that time, from 3.3 percent to 16.1 percent. . . .
And it’s no longer just for religious conservatives. There has been a big jump in “second choice” homeschoolers, who choose the option for more pragmatic reasons. With more parents working from home when the pandemic began, they had a bird’s-eye view of K-12 education in the age of COVID. Many didn’t like what they saw.