> It's telling that the kids don't jump in here to defend the practice, hardly ever...

Homeschooled kids are a minority, and therefore formerly-homeschooled adults are a minority too. More of a minority, even (since the rate of homeschooling was lower when we were growing up). It's not "telling", it's simply the fact that not a ton of people exist to give a defense.

For my part I was homeschooled and had a great experience. My parents were able to challenge me in ways that the local public school wasn't willing to, and they made consistent efforts to make sure I had social exposure to other kids. I don't believe I am lacking in any way because my parents homeschooled me - in fact, if anything I believe it was the better option for me.

And I think you need to remember that the other side of the coin exists too. My wife went to public school, and was bullied by other kids. She has social anxiety and other issues to this day (she's 42 years old) as a result. That doesn't mean public schools are all bad, of course, but people need to stop ignoring the downsides of public school when they compare the two paradigms.

Counterpoint - why don't we see defense of homeschooling at the same rate of attacks? Even if they are rare, there are several posters here that have experienced bad home schools. If they are at least 50:50, shouldn't we expect the same rate of defense? That we don't see that is telling.

Being bullied sucks and has huge negative impacts. I am glad though, that I have the tools and experience to identify that happening now that I am an adult. A homeschooled me might not, and then suffer much more in the adult sphere. Negative interactions are something kids have to learn to deal with. It's not pretty or fair or even safe, but neither is the world.

My sense is that we do see defense at approximately the same rate as attacks (if not higher), but the attacks stand out more because negative emotions weigh more than positive ones. Even if we didn't see equal rates, that would be expected for the same reason: someone who hates that their parents homeschooled them is far more likely to get on and post a scathing comment than someone who loved the experience.

Companies have to bribe and cajole customers to leave positive reviews because otherwise the few people with disastrous experiences will be the only ones who bother to review at all. There's no equivalent pro-homeschool lobby begging people to get on and defend homeschooling on Hacker News.

This is the classic problem solved by Bayes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZGCoVF3YvM there just aren't that many homeschooled people to provide a defense.

I'm another successful homeschooled-until-college adult, but homeschooling isn't that common now and it was even less popular when I was growing up.

EDIT: unless you were mentioning defense of homeschooling given they were homeschooled. I would assume most people on HN who were homeschooled had a decent education/homeschooling experience.

Since we're simply in speculation land, perhaps happy homeschooled adults are less screen-obsessed than those who went to 'normal' school or those poorly homeschooled and thus have better things to do with their life?

> Negative interactions are something kids have to learn to deal with. It's not pretty or fair or even safe, but neither is the world.

Completely agree. If someone assaults you in real life, you should learn that you need to file charges to ensure your assaulter goes to jail. Not sit quietly in the corner while your abuser gets a talking to.

> Completely agree. If someone assaults you in real life, you should learn that you need to file charges to ensure your assaulter goes to jail. Not sit quietly in the corner while your abuser gets a talking to.

Filing charges to make sure your assaulter goes to jail is a fantasy for many people and situations. Just like in school, justice is not always going to happen. Sorry.

Also, should we through 10 year old bullies in jail? 15? What’s the line?

> If someone assaults you in real life, you should learn that you need to file charges to ensure your assaulter goes to jail.

If someone assaults me I have to become a public prosecutor?

Victims, qua victims, can file a police report. But only the state can file criminal charges, and whether they will or won't depends on, well, lots of things outside of the control of thr victim.

read plus the internet are a bit challenging for them :P

You must be skipping over all of the comments on this thread where homeschooled kids do exactly that.

Hi. I was homeschooled. I graduated university top of my class, have a high-skill high-paying job, think more critically (about everything including religion) than most people that I know, and overall I enjoy my life very much. I'm homeschooling my kids.

Pretty similar background here. Maybe successfully homeschooled adults are just hesitant to dive into this sort of discussion anecdote first?

Given the stigma that many people still associate, we probably learned not to talk about it, maybe even subconsciously.

You should be hesitant.

Agreed: generally speaking, diving into any discussion anecdote-first is unhelpful and should be avoided.

It's a pity that some people will take a collection of anecdotes as data and treat a lack of countering anecdotes as conclusive proof.

Yeah that’s what I was trying to imply.

That's BS. I was unschooled (except for paying my way for my associate's degree when I was 13), and I wouldn't put a kid through school. The freedom let me get my first coding job at 17, and I was freelancing well before that. I got to do what I wanted, and I would be crippled if I was stuck in the thought patterns that public school entails.

Socialization was hard, mostly because the other kids my age were really, well, dumb. I am still friends with every good friend I had back then. I noticed plenty of problems with other homeschoolers, but nowhere near as bad as the school kids I knew. They were growing up either stressed beyond belief, addicted to drugs, or promiscuous. Occasionally all three. Compared to my religious fundamentalist friend who is now a happily married mechanical engineer, their "enhanced socialization" is worthless.

It's not like kids learn anything in school anymore. Our test scores are nationally tanking, the only reason to get good grades is to get into a better school which will probably not teach you anything valuable, and real knowledge is increasingly devalued. I was raised and taught that knowledge is its own reward, and if you're smart and good at learning, you can do anything you put your mind to.

Guess what? It's true.

You can say it until you're blue in the face, point out how obviously true it is, and they can't see it. They'll invent excuses why you're wrong.

What are you working on?

Was in e-commerce, got burned out doing meaningless work, so now I'm working at a pro-farm non-profit. I get to be self-directed and smart.

Tech for ag? I think that's an underserved market, although not totally neglected, of course.

Tech for community ag advocacy. Much more people-focused, product engineering type work. Great stuff.

Almost everyone I knew who was homeschooled had no noticeable social problems. Most had successful careers and marriages. Of course the fact that I knew them meant their parents were allowing them into a variety of social situations.

There's a selection bias where people who are happy and well-adjusted don't spend their lives picking fights on comment forums.

My siblings and I were all home schooled until college. We all have advanced degrees, families, and high paying professional jobs. My socialization was great. There is barely a memory of mine growing up were my siblings and I weren't out with friends in the neighborhood. Home school isn't for everyone and neither is public school. Personally I wouldn't trade my experience for anything.