Homeschoolers Pass the Torch

by Isabel Lyman

Meet three homeschooled Generation X couples who have learned how to succeed and who intend to pass on this legacy by teaching their own children at home.

Leave it to the National Education Association to be behind the times. Every year at their annual convention, they craft a lame resolution that denounces home educators. According to last year’s Resolution B-69, “home schooling programs cannot provide the student with a comprehensive education experience.”

It may come as a shock to the NEA, but many homeschooled students have already received a ?comprehensive education.? In fact, some have graduated, grown up, and become productive members of their communities.

They are successful entrepreneurs, military officers, and public officials. They have graduated from medical, law, and graduate school. Sometimes they even marry fellow homeschoolers. And guess what? Some of those couples are now schooling their own children at home.

Meet three couples who are members of Generation X — the Martins, the Murpheys, and the Ledfords.

The Martins

Tim Martin, 28, and his wife, Amy, 27, live in Whitehall, Montana, with their three children — Micaiah, 6, Caleb, 4, and Joelle, 2. Tim is a small business owner and a church elder. The oldest of six children, Tim was homeschooled from 5th grade through 11th grade in Florida, while Amy, one of five children, was taught at home during her elementary school years in Colorado. They both graduated from private, Christian schools. Together, they are homeschooling their brood.

?Education just works better one on one. No school environment — no matter how much money, no matter how good — can compete with homeschooling in this,? remarks Tim. ?Why do we think the ‘right’ way to do education is to put 20 or 30 children in a classroom with one teacher? The model is more fit for manufacturing than education.?

Tim prefers homeschooling over public education, where “age-segregated activities occur without end before school, after school, on weekends, and during summertime.” ?Good family life,? he observes, ?is not strengthened when everyone, down to the pre-schooler, rushes around trying to maintain a hectic schedule.?

Their curriculum includes a version of the ?Great Books,? as well as writing and math. They incorporate physical activity into their family’s homeschooling routine, like working in the garden or hiking in Glacier National Park. Steve Wagner, Amy’s father, runs a community center for homeschooled students in Whitehall. Christened the Education Station, Wagner invites speakers, from time to time, to lecture on an eclectic selection of topics from the law to the media.

While Amy manages the daily details of teaching and caring for her youngsters, Tim actively participates in the education process. ?I read the books Micaiah reads before they are given to him,? he says. ?Sometimes, we’ll read a book that I believe to be deficient. We’ll stop and talk about items that need to be corrected as we go.? He says he corrected several historical gaffes when the pair read a biography about Christopher Columbus.

Tim believes that fathers need to be involved in homeschooling when the children are very young. ?If you don’t start early enough, you won’t have the good relationships to build upon in the middle and late years of homeschooling.? He also argues that lack of paternal involvement can negatively affect a child’s development.

The Murpheys

The Murpheys, unlike the Martins, don’t awaken to mountain-top views, since they live in central Oklahoma. Jason, 24, and his wife, Raleah, 30, have two sons, Jarod, 3, and Jarel, 1. Jason, the older of two children, was homeschooled in Oklahoma from the 6th through the 12th grade, while his wife attended public school in Missouri and was one of 13 children. The couple plans to educate their boys at home because they believe direct involvement in their sons’ lives makes practical sense. ?A third party won’t have the interest in our children that we would,? says Jason.

Jason is a member of the Guthrie City Council and is running for a seat on the county commission this summer. He is also a talented webmaster who designed an Internet website that includes a section on Frederic Bastiat, the famed French economist. He says the ?public school mentality? is the dominant philosophy espoused by his fellow elected officials. ?The mental outlook is one of being nice to the right people, so you’ll be popular,? he observes.

Jason has combined his passion for politics and home education in a way that he hopes will impact future generations. In alliance with the Oklahoma Federation of Young Republicans, he is developing a mentoring program to pair home scholars with officeholders adhering to a conservative philosophy of governance.

?Upon graduation from high school or college, we would then sponsor those students for elective office,? explains Jason. ?It is my intent to provide a vehicle by which the homeschooling revolution is carried out in Oklahoma government by invading the system with our fellow homeschoolers.?

As for his own homeschooled past, the young politician has fond memories. ?I was able to get a practical education while I also did traditional academics. I listened to (daytime) talk radio, and I worked part-time at my dad’s publishing company,? he reminisces. ?Being able to work in my interests made it more fun.?

The Ledfords

Gabe and Bonnie Ledford, both 25, live in Enterprise, Alabama. She works as an emergency room nurse, and he is a first lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force. Gabe, who has an older brother, was homeschooled in Michigan by a mother who was not a college graduate. By age 15, he was taking courses at a local community college, and at age 17 he won an appointment to the Air Force Academy in Colorado. He is one of the first homeschooled students to gain admission into the academy and is presently training to be a helicopter pilot.

Bonnie began her homeschooling later than her husband (in the ninth grade) and was also taught by her mother. ?My mom did a great job as a high school teacher. She knows about history and chemistry, so I feel I received the best education,? she says.

Bonnie prepared for her nursing career by using her high school years to volunteer at a nursing home and in a hospital candy striper program. She graduated from Milligan College in Tennessee and has served as a counselor at a crisis pregnancy center.

If she becomes a mom, will she and her husband consider homeschooling their children?

?I definitely will [homeschool] when they are young. Homeschooling is very popular in the military, because you move around so much, and you don’t always know how the new school will be,? she says. Bonnie also appreciates that the homeschooling movement has grown so much since her high school days, and notes that ?there is more for homeschoolers to do socially.

By embracing the homeschooling lifestyle, these young couples seem to appreciate the sacrifices their parents made to teach them at home. What a commendable way to honor your mother and father.

Reprinted with permission.
First printing: The New American , April 22, 2002.
Online: http://www.thenewamerican.com/The New American,
PO Box 8040, Appleton, WI 54912
Isabel Lyman, a homeschooling mom, holds a doctoral degree in social science and is the author of The Homeschooling Revolution (2000). Meet ?Izzy? at the New England Homeschool & Family Learning Conference, in Boxborough, MA on July 19 and 20, 2002. See page 20 for more details.