Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Education in the U.S. is traditionally seen as a public good, one that not only benefits society by promoting the most able to the most challenging positions, but also by providing all citizens with basic skills necessary to participate in society and public life. Schools have struggled with providing both excellence and equity and many criticize schools for failing to meet either. Some parents have chosen to educate their children outside the public school system to address their childrens' academic needs. As home schooling grows, an examination of educational practices and beliefs reveals tensions between excellence and equity that reflect public school dilemmas. How do home schooling parents understand the goal of education, and how do their practices reflect and contradict their beliefs about school and education? This paper addresses beliefs about education, school, and community, and examines the tensions between beliefs and practices. This research suggests that parents, teachers, and the state view education and school differently. This clash of beliefs and practices currently impacts parents more than the state’s actions. However, as parents become more savvy consumers of school and curriculum, the state’s definition of education may also have to change to keep parents involved in its programs. Parents' definition of what counts as education may also change as they encounter state regulations on a personal level as home schoolers. This negotiation of meaning may change practices of education.