Abnormality, thy name is homeschool by Steve Kellmeyer

Read this excellent commentary on compulsory school attendance laws, the advent of mass schooling, the obliteration of family cohesion thanks to both of these and, of course, his take on homeschooling.
The author notes,
" In 1860, one-third of the 300 high schools in the country were located in Massachusetts, where the school year was twelve weeks long, and only six of those weeks were consecutive. Even by 1890, the school year was only twelve to twenty weeks. Even by 1900, only six percent of American teenagers had graduated high school, only two percent of Americans 18 through 24 were enrolled in a college.
While most Americans had attended an elementary school of some sort prior to 1900, they spent no more than two to three years in it, if that — perhaps forty weeks total. While in school, they were generally not learning to read. They learned that at home."


Steve Kellmeyer
April 28, 2005


For most Americans, homeschooling seems rather odd. Why bother with it? We have had public and private schools with us all of our lives, as have our parents before us and their parents before them from time immemorial. Why not stick with what works? The thought would be touching, if it were historically accurate. It isn't.

The concept of compulsory schools with mass attendance is a radically new idea to Western civilization, no older than industrialization. Indeed, industrialization arguably could not have taken place without the mass school, and therein lies a tale.