GoBigEd

Tuesday, January 21, 2003



DO YOUNG RETIREES HAVE THE ANSWER -- START THEIR OWN SMALL SCHOOLS?

(A 60-year-old grandmother in northeast Nebraska was listening to me talk on Omaha radio station KCRO, 660 AM, Monday about the future of public education, and how I think the system is broken and we need to privatize it and get kids into private schools and home schools. Here's her response:)

" For several months now I have felt . . . I don't know if I should call it a 'call' on my life or what . . . but it's getting more overwhelming by the minute as I observe the stuff going on even right in this tiny town . . . to grab whatever child I can get my grandmaw hands on and set up a homeschool right here in my house.

"I am 60 years old, with only a smattering of college education as a Licensed Vocational Nurse and that was 40 years ago. And sometimes I can be a real basket case if I get overwhelmed with stuff.

"But I want to do this. Am I nuts???

"Here's why . . . I was visiting with my neighbors last night. They have four children, ages 10 to 13. The subject of home schooling came up. The 13-year-old girl promptly stated that 'there is no socialization for a home schooled child.'

"OK . . . where did she hear this? At school? Sure makes me wonder.

"The 10-year-old has been diagnosed with ADD and put on Ritalin, and after two months told by the family physician she had to 'wean herself off it' as it was damaging her liver!

"I watched the three girls most of last week while their brother was having surgery on an ear in Omaha. The 'socialization' they were talking about consisted of trying every way they could to sneak around and get boys over to their house alone . . . on the phone or internet constantly . . . every time I was not right there riding herd on them.

"There is a continual whirlwind of football games, basketball games, volleyball games . . . and they have the 'gotta have its' . . . like Nikes and Skechers (or is it Screechers?) and ad nauseum.

"It's the same with every young child in this town. By 15 when they get their learner's permits you can find them cruising all night in their or their parent's cars, at least 50 MPH down our residential street, looking to pick up some member of the opposite sex.

"Socialization, huh? Can you spell 'anarchy,' out of control, materialistic, God-forsaking little hedonists who can't even read???

"And yet I see in most of them a spark, still, of innocence . . . of 'reachability' if that is a word, for Jesus. I see tender hearts that are not quite yet set in concrete. I want get to them before the hardness sets in.

"Again I ask . . . am I nuts???"

Well? Is she? Share your thoughts: swilliams1@cox.net

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