02-09-2017, 01:47 PM
DeVos Backlash Sees Parents Threatening to Homeschool Kids
Among the initial opposition to Betsy DeVos' confirmation this week as education secretary were calls on social media by parents, including liberals, to start homeschooling their children.
That reaction to DeVos — a billionaire school-choice advocate who has never worked, attended or sent her kids to a public school — reflects how polarizing her nomination was.
It also comes layered with paradox.
That's because DeVos, whom the Senate confirmed Tuesday to head the Education Department, is herself a big proponent of homeschooling.
In a 2013 interview with Philanthropy magazine, DeVos, who has invested in private and charter schools and is an advocate for their expansion, said homeschooling was "another perfectly valid educational option."
"DeVos would love nothing better than for parents to decide to spend their money on private Christian schools ... or to homeschool them using Christian curriculums," said Milton Gaither, an education professor at Messiah College in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, who researches the homeschool movement and wrote a book about it.
Asked whether it seemed ironic that some liberals were now talking about homeschooling, Gaither said no: In a sense, those potential converts would mark a return to the fold of left-wing parents who gave helped give birth to the movement in the early 1970s.
Well that's kind of win-win I guess. DeVos and conservatives get what they want, liberal parents get what they want. The only people who lose are those who are working parents who are too poor and lack the time to homeschool their kids. Those folks might be stuck sending their kids to poorly funded schools that teach the Earth is 6000 years old.
Among the initial opposition to Betsy DeVos' confirmation this week as education secretary were calls on social media by parents, including liberals, to start homeschooling their children.
That reaction to DeVos — a billionaire school-choice advocate who has never worked, attended or sent her kids to a public school — reflects how polarizing her nomination was.
It also comes layered with paradox.
That's because DeVos, whom the Senate confirmed Tuesday to head the Education Department, is herself a big proponent of homeschooling.
In a 2013 interview with Philanthropy magazine, DeVos, who has invested in private and charter schools and is an advocate for their expansion, said homeschooling was "another perfectly valid educational option."
"DeVos would love nothing better than for parents to decide to spend their money on private Christian schools ... or to homeschool them using Christian curriculums," said Milton Gaither, an education professor at Messiah College in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, who researches the homeschool movement and wrote a book about it.
Asked whether it seemed ironic that some liberals were now talking about homeschooling, Gaither said no: In a sense, those potential converts would mark a return to the fold of left-wing parents who gave helped give birth to the movement in the early 1970s.
Well that's kind of win-win I guess. DeVos and conservatives get what they want, liberal parents get what they want. The only people who lose are those who are working parents who are too poor and lack the time to homeschool their kids. Those folks might be stuck sending their kids to poorly funded schools that teach the Earth is 6000 years old.
![[Image: 4CV0TeR.png]](https://i.imgur.com/4CV0TeR.png)
