Thanks again to Elinor Bowles of Educating While Black for asking me to do a brief series on Homeschooling. And another reminder that later this month Patricia Patton of Black Boomer Bloggers will be hosting a tweet chat on my homeschooling book, Morning by Morning: How We Home-Schooled Our African-American Sons to the Ivy League. So whatever Elinor and I don’t cover here on Facebook I’ll try and address with Patricia.
Elinor wanted to know 1) Why we homeschooled; 2) How we homeschooled; 3) What we learned from homeschooling; and 4) The end results of homeschooling. Yesterday I posted the first of a two-part a preamble “Black Homeschooling: Disclaimers, Mythology and that Pesky Socialization Question…a short set of disclaimers and the debunking of some mythology and today I’m finishing up with the Socialization Question. Next week I’ll get down to the real nitty-gritty of Elinor’s queries about the why, what and how of our homeschooling adventure.
Here’s the socialization part…
Since 1991, when the topic of our homeschooling comes up, either as an idea, in 1991; a process, 1991-2000; or a fait accompli, something that’s been done and can’t be undone, 2000 onward; the most consistent comment remains “What about their socialization?” And like many comments masquerading as inquiry, the one about socialization comes from a place of presumptions, both overt and covert, pretending to be facts.
The overt presumption is that socialization happens exclusively or at least primarily at school. The covert presumption is that the socialization spoken of in such reverential terms is vibrant, holistic and healthy. Both presumptions are deeply flawed.
Let me start with correcting the overt presumption. Homeschooling does not impede socialization. Socialization may be healthy or unhealthy, but it is a continuous process that begins in utero and never ends. Initially physiological and originating in biological connections between the mother, the father and the community, it is well underway long before pre-school and continues far beyond the confines of even post-doctoral programs. So no, children do not need to go to school to be socialized.
Now for the covert presumption. The socialization that does happen at school has not proven to be holistically healthy and this is particularly true for black, American boys. CMadison and I focused on this specific demographic cohort, not because we were unaware or unconcerned about the challenges facing black, American girls, or black immigrant children, or Hispanic, immigrant children, or bi-racial children, or children with incarcerated parents or caucasian-white American children.. We’re concerned about all children. But our primary responsibility was the holistic care and development of our children-who happen to be black, 9th generation, native-born, American males. Roughly 80% of classroom teachers in grades K-12 are caucasian-white American women and black, American boys are consistently in the bottom quadrant of almost all statistical measurements except athletics. Those statistics tend to be inelastic, meaning the findings remain consistent across traditional boundaries of urban, suburban or rural school districts; public, private or parochial schools; and regardless of the educational attainment levels or marital status of the parents. These are just one set of facts to be examined. The complex intersection of race and gender contributes to much of the socialization challenges in traditional educational institutions. This is just one analysis of the facts. Given both, it is not surprising that rates of discipline, detention, suspension, expulsion and arrest of black American boys are wildly inconsistent with their percentage of representation in the U.S. school population. While it may be more exciting to refer to these well-known statistics as a conspiracy, that nomenclature is incorrect. Secrecy is a core element in the legal definition of conspiracy. The systemic structures and scaffolding supporting the documented and widely lamented school-to-prison pipeline are not now, nor have they ever been secret. These hegemonic devises and the burgeoning cottage industry of critique and complaint are all part of the socialization process that links the goals of public, private and parochial education, namely the preparation of the next generation of citizens to take their place as producer, participant or public protester, but rarely as change agent.
So what’s my response to the “what about their socialization” comment? I gently suggest that before lamenting homeschooling’s missed opportunities for socialization one should schedule a visit to the local juvenile detention center, jail, workhouse or penitentiary and see what percentage of our incarcerated brothers and sisters were homeschooled. Then we can speak about the socialization of institutional education.