 Dear reader,
The pandemic fueled many new trends in education. Some are predictable (colleges are raising tuition, again) and others less so, including an increasingly diverse set of parents who are choosing home schooling.
For years, home schooling was associated with white, Christian fundamentalists: In 1994, over 90 percent of families who home-schooled were white. The Hechinger Report found that rates of home schooling doubled from the start of the pandemic to the fall of that year, with a five-fold increase in home schooling among Black families – and increases across all racial groups.
I wrote about another trend that’s threatening public education this week: The amount of control parents and state legislatures want over what is being taught, especially as it relates to discussions of diversity, gender, race and history.
For me, the story is a walk down memory lane. I spent my early years as an education reporter covering book and curriculum bans and heard many of the same arguments we’re hearing today. This time, though, teachers and school board members say they are getting death threats. Bills in some states also propose to criminally prosecute schools and public libraries for having books and materials that contain obscenity, violence or pornography.
We see these trends happening all over the country, and we want to hear from you, our readers, about how they’re affecting you and your schools. Please get in touch, and remind others to sign up for our weekly newsletters.
Liz Willen, Editor
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Main Idea
