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Comment by vivekd | Hacker News Reader

So many opponents to homeschooling are talking about socialization as the key component of schooling. This seems misguided. Modern schools seem to be a terrible environment to socialize kids, with things like bulling, weapons, drugs, sexting, sex. It seems like utter madness to want to have your kids "socialized" in an environment like that. There are much better places and environments for them to be around and socialize with other kids, for example extracurricular sports teams, religious events etc. I remember when I was a kid, I used to go out and play with the neighborhood kids, and it didn't matter that I didn't go to the same school as they did. There was a whole whole word of socializing that occurred before schools and I don't think children will lose much socializing without schools.

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> Modern schools seem to be a terrible environment to socialize kids, with things like bulling, weapons, drugs, sexting, sex

Look, I'm no fan of modern schooling (public or private), but this is pretty ridiculous.

Bullying: I was bullied far more by the neighborhood kids than anyone at school. YMMV of course, but that's exactly the point -- kids are kids, and leaving the school building doesn't change that. Blaming school missing the point.

Also, RE: churches, they're one of the few widespread institution where it's not abnormal for adults to gather and condemn people who are different (LGBT, non-sexually-repressed). It's just that churches have a much better grasp on socially appropriate rhetoric (not "faggot!" but "sinful lifestyle", not "slut!" but "you must save yourself for marriage". It's more subtle, but the intended effect is the same: otherizing people who are different from or disagree with the in-group and shaming them into conformance).

If your child is gay, the local church youth group is very likely one of the most intense bullying experiences that child will ever experience.

Sex: Teenagers are going to know and think about sex. Consider e.g. religious events for adolescents, which often explicitly discuss sex in a very moralizing way. In fact, IMO, having attended one, American conservative christian youth groups are one of the least healthy places to learn about sexuality.

Weapons: I've been in a lot of schools, and in every single one of them, anything as much as a pocket knife was a huge deal.

Drugs: Again, far more likely to encounter these hanging out with the neighborhood kids than in the (incredibly risky) setting of a modern school. Even the more die hard pot heads are rarely stupid enough to bring their drugs to school.

So if "bullying, sex, drugs, and weapons" were my greatest fears, I'd probably lock my kids in school 24/7 and never let them play in the neighborhood without adult supervision.

>...I don't think children will lose much socializing without schools.

I don't think children necessarily have to lose much socializing without schools. But the anecdotal evidence I have suggests that providing sufficient socialization is much harder than it sounds.

what school did you go to - drugs and weapons were everywhere in my school. I bought pot off my classmates.

Wouldn't these same classmates also be likely to participate in extracurricular sports, attend religious events, etc?

If drugs were everywhere in school, the kids aren't leaving them in lockers when they go home, and it's not like there's a big tall wall that separates these alleged weapon-smuggling drug dealers from the "good kids" on the home-schooled side either.

Because church groups and extracurricular sports teams and home schools all have a stake in protecting the kids. School shootings, stabbings and drug dealings happen every day, and no one gets fired, no one gets in trouble, no one gets sued. It is very different with other groups like churches or sports teams.

If any other organization had anywhere near the track record for deaths and serious injuries and addictions that government run schools had with our children, it would be shut down in no time.

Who do you expect to get fired for a school shooting? And what do you mean, no one gets sued? That's flat-out not true.

http://www.heraldnet.com/news/teacher-wants-out-of-marysvill...

http://www.whio.com/news/crime--law/350k-lawsuit-filed-madis...

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/families-washington...

Only one of those incidents is of a lawsuit against a teacher, the other two incidents are of a lawsuit against the families. And there is a very good reason for this. There is state immunity granted to teachers and schools in that they cannot be sued for grossly negligent supervision that allows a stream of drugs, guns, knives and sex to flow into children under their care.

You can see it mentioned in your first article:

>her attorneys cite a state law that gives school districts and their employees immunity from liability if they make a good faith effort to report threats of violence.

so even if a student threatens violence, as long as the teacher reports it, there will no liability to her or the school even if they didn't do anything to stop the violence or supervise the children adequately. This statute is actually more lenient than other areas where it is complete immunity.

Now this immunity is limited to state actors and does not apply to private schools, churches or sports teams. And I believe that without these protections public schools would have been sued out of existence long ago for the horrible things constantly happening to children under their care.

> as long as the teacher reports it, there will no liability to her or the school even if they didn't do anything to stop the violence

I'm not sure what you expect a teacher to do. Break the student's arms? Search their bag, home, neighborhood for any guns and remove them? Duct-tape them to their desk and set a bucket underneath?

No I just meant that under ordinary cirumstances, where there is no explicit threat made, there can be no legal liability on part of the school or teacher. And even when there is a threat made, so long as some report is made to her superiors (under the statute it's made reasonable attempts to report, not actually report and says report not call law enforcement or take steps like suspension or talking to the kid") there can be no legal liability. That's an extraordinary amount of protection from legal liability that private sector actors do not enjoy. In the private sector you can get sued for negligent supervision, and failing to act on threats can get you sued, you can't just say "I reported it to my supervisors" and leave it at that.

I'm not faulting the teachers, I'm talking more about legal liability in terms of sovereign immunity which limits or negates the liability of states from lawsuits.

http://usedulaw.com/340-immunity-educational-law.html

> what school did you go to

Nice enough to have a few decent AP classes, bad enough that we walked through metal detectors. But my assessment is even more colored by the dozens of schools I've volunteered in.

What kind of school did you go to?

> Because church groups and extracurricular sports teams and home schools all have a stake in protecting the kids

What about unstructured socializing? Or are you suggesting that children should spend the first 18 years of their life under constant adult supervision?

Basically, my point is this: whenever there are weapons and drugs in the school, there are a lot more of those same weapons and drugs outside of school.

So either you have to keep a constant eye on the kids and and strictly control the social group until they leave for college, or else these problems are more pronounced outside of school than inside of school.

> School shootings, stabbings and drug dealings happen every day, and no one gets fired, no one gets in trouble, no one gets sued

Nothing you're saying here is factually accurate.

School shooters typically kill themselves or are killed.

School officials (teachers, etc.) are often themselves killed during school shootings. Complaining that those officials aren't posthumously fired seems... crazy.

Families effected by school shootings do sue.

And people definitely get in trouble all the time for dealing drugs and bringing weapons to school. Which is why both are far more common outside of school.

> What about unstructured socializing?

I disagree with vivekd on many points, but I don't think that schools offer many more unstructured opportunities for socialization than their examples. They get a few minutes in the hallway, and then maybe lunch, and then extracurricular activities - which he's already suggesting anyway.

Yes, I'm not making that argument. My argument is only that you aren't going to avoid "bullying, sex, drugs, weapons" by avoiding school -- at least not without being overbearing.

I.e., if you rule out all unstructured socializing, then avoiding school might be an effective way to avoid "bullying, sex, drugs, weapons". But if you don't rule out unstructured socializing, then ruling out school isn't going to help much.

Oh, I see, I completely misunderstood your point. My bad.

I think public schools foster an environment of sex, bullying, drugs and weapons by getting large groups of children together and offering very little supervision. I don't think those kinds of environments could exist outside of modern schools.

Yes giving kids alone time is fine, but leaving a large group of kids together under the supervision of very few adults and repeating this 5 days a week for several years is going to have some effect.

And I think that opinion is both unsubstantiated and incorrect, especially wrt drugs and sex. Do you have any data backing this assertion?

There is some evidence:

For example this study shows that home schooled children are significantly less likely to drink or do drugs

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4652803/

but I will admit that studies comparing home school children to public school children are too few and far between to draw meaningful scientific conclusions. Also the large numbers of religious homeschoolers throws the numbers off.

I'm just relying on reasoning. A child who spends most of their time being raised by their parents is in a much better position to avoid negative outcomes than those raised by a paid supervisor, no matter how well qualified. Love makes a difference, parents love their children, teachers, while no doubt caring, don't have the same love and definitely lack the resources to provide the same individualized attention.

Further, public school, due to powerful teachers unions and parent counsels are anything but meritocracies. The good teachers are not always the ones that thrive and rise to the top.

I wonder if anyone's done a study of their attitudes towards these things after graduating high school; do they smoke, drink and/or do drugs in college?

I think the goal of moderating drug use in adolescence should be 1) harm mitigation, and 2) instilling healthy drug use habits and mindsets.

2 is particularly important. We tend to think of drugs as "bad" when talking about kids, and then turn around and have a beer, smoke a cigarette, drink way too much coffee/caffeine/sugar, or in some jurisdictions consume cannabis. So our goal shouldn't be adolescent abstinence -- rather, the goal should be setting kids up for a life of healthy interactions with drugs. In a few rare cases that will be actualized in the form of abstinence, but in most cases it will take some other form. For this reason, I tend to ignore data that doesn't distinguish between "healthy" and various forms of "unhealthy" drug use.

Interpreting this data is extremely difficult.

Your interpretation is that schools are causing increased substance abuse.

But an equally reasonable (which is to say, not at all reasonable) interpretation is that home schooled students are more likely to have a flat, legalistic, and ultimately unhelpful understanding of drug use that will come back to bite them in the ass later in life.

For example:

* homeschoolers are more strongly disapproving of any alcohol consumption, but there's no difference in opinion about smoking 1+ packs a day. Even though the former can be non-harmful or even healthy, while the latter is pretty uniformly incredibly unhealthy. Perhaps this is because they're more concerned with following laws than healthy drug use patterns?

* Late adolescent home schooled students and early adolescent home schooled students are equally disapproving of peer alcohol consumption. To me it's weird/creepy that a 13 y/o and 18 y/o would have the same attitudes toward peer alcohol consumption, and indicates that maybe the 18 y/o's opinion is more indicative of ignorance or blind rule-following than any sort of healthy attitude about drug use per se. There is absolutely nothing unhealthy about an 18 y/o occasionally consuming alcohol (or anyways, no more unhealthy than a 21 y/o).

* A lot of the questions refer to any drug use, as opposed to abuse or modes of unhealthy use. And home schooled kids tend to be equally disapproving, or in some cases more disapproving of healthy use of stigmatized drugs than of unhealthy use of less stigmatized drugs.

* Some of the related work suggests that "homeschooled adolescents engage in less substance use than non-homeschooled adolescents, although religious ties was an important moderator in this relationship". Which makes a lot of sense, given that the overall range of opinions tends to be more indicative of unscientific moralization of drug use than of health-conscious substance use patterns.

(There's also some weird effects in this data, like home schooled kids having a harder time getting alcohol but not having a harder time getting LSD...)

To be clear, I don't think this interpretation is particularly reasonable. But I also think it's about as reasonable an extrapolation from the data as your interpretation that schools are causing the gap in the data.

> public school... are anything but meritocracies

I largely agree with criticism of educational quality provided by our schools.

I don't think it's correct to blame unions and tenure though, because non-elite private schools tend to be pretty crap as well. In both cases, the solution is probably a combination of high social status and (much) higher pay for teachers. This can be paired with eliminating tenure and unions, but doing that without significant improvements to pay will only make the job less attractive and thereby decrease quality.

It certainly is unhealthy for an 18 y/o to consume alcohol, and your "no more unhealthy than a 21 y/o" comment doesn't change that. Alcohol causes stomach cancer (really sucks), liver cancer (that sucks too), mouth and throat cancer (totally sucks), breast cancer (also sucks). Alcohol deforms the unborn. Alcohol indirectly causes car crashes, pregnancy, STDs, drowning, and all sorts of criminal charges. If homeschooled students disapprove, good!

The equal LSD availability, combined with reduced alcohol availability, suggests that "turn around and have a beer" isn't happening in these homes. LSD use is rare everywhere, but alcohol is only rare in the homeschooling homes.

Your fear of alcohol is incredibly irrational. There is absolutely no evidence that moderate alcohol consumption causes any of those things.

All of the cancer risks are linked to heavy drinking (usually 3+ drinks a day over a prolonged period of time), and there's absolutely no evidence that occasional moderate alcohol consumption poses a health risk greater than any number of other extremely low risk activities. Certainly not greater than a pack a day of cigarettes. (Furthermore, some studies have indicated that moderate alcohol consumption can even have positive health benefits, including decreased risks for some cancers.)

Similarly, alcohol in moderation causes none of the "indirect" things you mention.

You are free to assert an arbitrary moral superiority for abstention, but don't pretend like you have a rational basis for your opinions on the effect of moderate alcohol consumption. Pretending like all use is unhealthy is just as ignorant as the opposite extreme.

How do you know that your consumption will be moderate?

Some people lose control of their consumption. How do you justify any confidence that you won't be one of these people?

It's not as if the typical alcoholic just decided one day to be an alcoholic. For most it just... sort of happened. That could be you. Maybe not, perhaps probably not, but why would you take that risk? For little gain, you risk throwing away your life.

By consuming alcohol in moderation in the presence of a support network that will hold you accountable to that moderation. If people are not going to abstain for life -- and most won't! -- then learning how your body reacts to substances and how to moderate is an important life skill.

Tons and tons of people manage to drink without going am addiction.

And regarding risks, the same could be said for lots of things that are sometimes psychologically addictive -- internet, video games, shopping, etc.

> School shooters typically kill themselves or are killed.

Mass shooters, yes. Two kids exchanging fire in the parking lot? Not so much.

Note well: When I was in school, we never had a shooting, so my statement is unsupported by firsthand evidence.

> Two kids exchanging fire in the parking lot? Not so much.

Uh, no. Discharging fire arms at or around a school is taken incredibly seriously pretty much universally. Doing something like this would be more than enough for hard jail time.

This happened at my school while I was in high school (late at night, and had nothing to do with school -- it was just a shooting that by pure chance happened to take place right next to the school -- neither of the people involved were from the community or even school aged). There was a huge police investigation and the shooter was caught within days of the shooting.

e: If you think "two kids exchanging fire in the parking lot" is an example of tolerated behavior at schools, you should take it as an indication that you have a wildly inaccurate mental model of what schools are like.

Tolerated? No. You'd have to figure out who did it, though. (Maybe it's easier now. Back in my day, there weren't a lot of security cameras...)

Among high schoolers, within the month they were surveyed: 35% drank some alcohol 21% binge drank (consuming an excessive amount) 22% rode in someone’s car who’d been drinking 10% drove after drinking

The stats show that marijuana use is rampant: 35.1% of 12th graders have smoked pot in the past year 21.3% of 12th graders have smoked pot in the last 30 days 16.6% of 10th graders have smoked pot in the last 30 days 6% of 12th graders say they use marijuana every day 81% of 12th graders say it would be easy to get marijuana Only 32% of 12th graders feel that regular marijuana use is harmful — https://www.teenrehabcenter.org/resources/high-school-drug-u...

...checks out.

No one is denying that students experiment with sex and drugs.

Rather, the observation is that these things happen mostly outside of school, so avoiding schools isn't an effective way of avoiding this things.

The link between school and these activities is, IMO, largely specious. Or at the very least completely unsubstantiated by evidence.

Or are you seriously suggesting that kids are binge drinking and lighting up in between history and chemistry?

Basically, vivek's argument is that by not sending your kids to school you avoid all of these behaviors. But these behaviors are far more common outside of school that within school.

Home schooling doesn't replace effective parenting, and sending your kdis to a school doesn't preclude effective parenting.

Finally, I think it's worth asking so what?! to a lot of your statistics. Particularly the "drank some alcohol" and "smoked pot in the last 30 days" statistics. These things aren't a priori bad, and drinking at that age isn't even illegal in a lot of developed countries (and even in some places in the US, under adult supervision).

Also, I REALLY hate that link you posted. It's my observation that this sort of propaganda does far more harm than good.

Kids are smart. Claims that "marijuana and drinking are bad" tend to only have the effect of discrediting the speaker. Those claims are mostly specious, and kids know how to use Google. Citing something like "68% of 12th graders have tried alcohol" in a page decrying substance abuse makes one look like a scare mongering idiot. Seriously, these are 18 year olds -- that number is almost certainly close to 100% in a lot of developed countries.

But kids are also stupid. If you go on to tell them "binge drinking is bad, avoid it" or "prolonged marijuana use really can cause serious harm", they'll extrapolate that you're BSing them about that too.

Basically, scare mongering about any drug use only has the effect of making it far harder to warn kids about actual dangers.

Shootings, stabbings, ass-kickings and all kinds of other shenanigans occurred at my high school. At least in the neighborhood, I can choose to stay home if I wish.

> At least in the neighborhood, I can choose to stay home if I wish.

But then we're right back to the socialization problem that started this thread.

I understand what you're saying but hey, staying home is better than having the shit kicked out of me.

> If your child is gay, the local church youth group is very likely one of the most intense bullying experiences that child will ever experience.

Not only that, but if your child isn't of the inclination to be religious, it will also be a painful experience. Questioning the why behind and benefits of the religious faith of the group leaders and other youth group participants is a great way to be bullied and not only that, told you're wrong for thinking logically. That, plus the associated moralizing (i.e, "there is only one way, the right way, to be") I think are pretty damaging for kids.

Societally we are accepting of many more ways than the one proscribed by many churches. Being of one sexuality or another, or one morality or another, as long as you respect and help your fellow human beings when they are in need, should not matter. I wouldn't expose my kid to anything saying otherwise if I could help it.

>Modern schools seem to be a terrible environment to socialize kids, with things like bulling, weapons, drugs, sexting, sex

Do people spouting this have any kind of realistic evidence for how schools are so terrible for socializing, instead of spouting off folksy wisdom?

The whole "socialize, more like INSTITUTIONALIZE mirite guys?" just feels so flimsy and patronizing. Some are even comparing public schools to Lord of the Flies? That's just ridiculous.

uhhh, yeah - we attended public school.

>folksy wisdom

I also fail to see how any of those things listed are some how related specifically to schooling in any kind of institution. Everything that's listed exists in society by it's own "virtues." In fact, its rather silly to claim that homeschooling children will somehow not expose them to possibly more drugs, more weapons, more sexting, etc. It's not like the children and adults who bring forth those "qualities" of society are constrained at the public or private school walls. They're in your local bookstores, theaters, churches, youth groups, and your parks.

Yea married to teachers, have children in schools, went to schools are selves. Way more relevant than some jackasses study or some article.

> went to schools are selves

Still need some work though ;-)

Something something anecdote is not data.

I take it you've only been to either very high performing (nationally) public high schools or private schools?

I have a unique education background at that age - I was homeschooled until 5th grade, then went to a private religious school until 8th, then a private very high-end high school in 9th grade, and then a brand new suburban high school in 10th, and then inner city shitbox schools in 11th until I finally dropped out and took the GED since it was such a waste of my time.

In the good schools? You're pretty much correct. I can definitely see why a parent would not like a lot of what happens in them, but it's a bit much to call those social scenes dysfunctional entirely.

The inner city schools? Oh man, I would do anything to keep my kid out of such hellholes. I think you really need to volunteer in a Chicago south side or similar high school for a week - I haven't met anyone who's spent any time in that system who would ever send their children to them. It's social environment is more like a juvenile hall.

> Some are even comparing public schools to Lord of the Flies? That's just ridiculous.

I'd say it's a pretty apt comparison, murders and all for a significant portion of the US population.

>The inner city schools?

I could comment this with my own perspective fairly extensively, but quite honestly every time I give some kind of personal experience in this thread it's just met with snark, and every time I ask for objective evidence I get some "why trust some jackass's study" type of response. But, in my own experience, schools, even in the "inner city" (which just seems to be kind of key word for an aggregate of poorly functioning schools, or a poorly functioning student population), can still offer a bit of refuge from home life. Even poorly funded schools will have some great teachers/mentors.

So let me just ask this: How is home schooling going to fix such "hellholes"? You're effectively blaming an institution on the failings of the society around it; even when that institution actually provides a constructive outlet that most likely would not have ever been provided at home. And for all it's tasked with doing, this institution by the way, continues to be constrained by people who seem to hate it.

> But, in my own experience, schools, even in the inner city, can still offer a bit of refuge from home life

I've volunteered in the south side schools your parent mentioned, and I can think of some cases where this was definitely very true.

Of course, it's also true that all of those kids also would've been much better off in better schools.

> How is home schooling going to fix such "hellholes"?

If a family has an adult in the house hold who can stay home and educate the children, then they're definitely not living in these neighborhoods in the first place.

And in any case, that family would be much better off if the second parent works so that the family can move to a better neighborhood.

> I think you really need to volunteer in a Chicago south side or similar high school for a week

Yup, I've volunteered in one of these schools, and totally agree with your assessment.

That said, these really are the worst of the worst. Even most city schools have far more functional social scenes.

OT, but FWIW I've never really known what "inner city" means. Is it just code for "bad"? In most cities, there are definitely vast socio-economic geographic differences within the city, but those geographies aren't layered. So "inner" and "outer" doesn't describe them.

> OT, but FWIW I've never really known what "inner city" means.

In the US, it's a long-used code for "Black or Latino." Not that Wikipedia is authoritative, but here's a snip from Wikipedia:

"In the United States and United Kingdom, the term "inner city" is often used as a euphemism for lower-income residential districts in the city centre and nearby areas with, in the US, the additional connotation of impoverished black neighborhoods."

Basically, they don't mean the parts of inner cities where white people have displaced Black people. As gentrification expands, we will likely have to find another euphemism. The basic idea is you don't want to send your kid to school with "inner-city" kids if you can help it.

I am from Brazil, where there is a large divide in quality of public schools and private schools.

I went to private schools, and envied the columbine guys, when it hit the news, I wanted to do the same. (happily, I didn't).

Still, friend I had (outside of school) that went to public schools, were real Lord of the Flies material:

* One friend I had, once was assaulted by 3 bullies using their school scissors as a weapon, he reacted by bashing the head of one of them in using his skateboard, hitting his skull with the skateboard wheel supports.

* Another friend of mine broke someone jaw with a fire extinguisher in a school brawl.

And even in my private school:

* Some dude threw my sister into a construction area, after that she started to walk with a non-optical mouse ball in her pocket, she knocked a guy with it once after the guy stole her lunch.

* A kid from first grade made a hole in another kid skull using one of those traditional spinning tops made of wood and nail, this resulted in a spinning top ban.

* After the spinning top ban, the popular toy became yoyo, that also became banned after a kid tried to strangle another with the string.

* Metal rulers were forbidden, it is because some years earlier, before I joined the school, a group of kids figured they could sharpen the rulers until they were sharp, use them as swords, and steal all other kids, including much older ones, money.

And then we have incidents like this:

* Teacher in my high-school had some quirky behaviour regarding emergency staircase, later another teacher told us he witnessed a student jump from it headfirst in a fashion that made brain splatter all over the place.

* One of the highlights of my high-school principal career, is that when he was teacher in another school, one of his students put a bomb in a bathroom that was so strong the toilet he wanted to explode made a hole in the ceiling above.

* Kid got kicked out of school after arriving 6:30 in the morning blind drunk, got in a brawl with other students, and destroyed half of the desks in a classroom.

* Whole city was hit hard by the news that a group of 15 year old kids organized a massive party, then when it was time to leave one of them decided to drive home drunk, despite mininum driving age being 18 anyway, crashed, and killed himself, 2 more students, and left two others paraplegic.

And all that is from a relatively wealthy place, poorer areas we had kids murdering each other and teachers without even hitting the news.

And now some recent news about school incident, in portuguese, so you might need google translate:

http://www.vice.com/pt_br/read/aluno-morre-esfaqueado-escola...

The only value I ever saw in the socialization aspect was when we had early childhood education centers that were family oriented (as opposed to age) and the older kids taught the young kids to use the potty. After that, it was all power and cliques.

On a side note: in 1995 I used the word socialization in a sentence with a government official and immediately had to spend 5 minutes defining my meaning was not whatever she thought it was. Words mutate overtime in government and there are actually hot and cold words for grants. I'm pretty sure I would have got the same reaction even if she hadn't been a racist in the old sense (a shame when that happens to minorities particularly when its directed at other minorities).

> It seems like utter madness to want to have your kids "socialized" in an environment like that.

That's what society is. What's the point of socializing kids into anything other than the actual society?

Look around at what people do, at what people believe. Look at 4chan! Look at reddit!

The point is to subtract from all of that rather than add to it.

The children will have to enter that society at some point. Would it be better to wait until they leave for college and let them experience all of that at the same time, for the first time?

I have yet to have a post-public-school (college, work, sales, relationships, you-name-it) experience that even comes close to the barbarity of my in-public-school experience. I've seen things on TV in that vicinity, but not in real life -- knock on wood!

Of course, in my public school we had dudes who were fully-pubed driving their cars to the 6th grade, so kind of an extreme example.

Yes. They'll be better equipped to rationally comprehend, question, and appreciate the world at that age. It's the same as any adult would better appreciate and understand travelling and experiencing other cultures more than a child.

No, that's not what society is. Admittedly, public schools are doing their best to "shape" society with their own pathologies, but the behavior "socialized" in public schools still doesn't fly in the adult world. Most people spend their 20s unlearning that bizarre teenage socialization in the "school of hard knocks".

From my perspective, the world of the public school is actually what society is, like it or not. People don't encounter drugs, weapons, or sex in the adult world? The adult world doesn't have it's own "school of hard knocks"? News to me. (Sometimes this of course is due to poor life choices, but it's probably better to witness poor life choices firsthand.)

I'm ambivalent on homeschooling and it largely depends on motivation. I can absolutely buy homeschooling as an alternative to a poor public school district with no opportunity for quality education. I don't buy homeschooling as a way for parents to hide their children from "the real world" or other more ideological reasons, which from what I see sometimes does happen. This is a bad strategy; after all, in so many career paths who you know is just as important or even more import as what you know.

My guess is that homeschooling will produce both some of the best students and some of the worst, depending on the parent.

The worst of public school attendees in the United States join gangs and kill other human beings in US inner cities - I suspect that's much less common among homeschoolers. If true, I'd argue that the homeschool 'worst' is probably a lot better for society than the public school 'worst'. It would be an interesting research question. Disclosure: homeschooled our 4 kids, my eldest is 20 years old and working full time as a software engineer in sf. One down, three to go... :)

In the adult world, I'm much less mixed with people of different background. Sure in my coworking space there are translators, NGOs, ecologists, motion designers and programmers, but the thing is: They all work. If they beat or insult me, I can take then to court. Women also have a lot of protections against harassment. And I don't remember anyone talking about their swirlie experience in any workplace.

School, to me, is like jail: It's the only place where I can meet such unregulated behaviors.

First of all, what have you got against sex and weapons? Are you a commie or something? (/jk)

Second, yes, it's true that there are gangs, crime, bullying, popularity-obsessed people, etc., in the real world. But the difference is this: outside public school, those are bad behaviors, which lead to unsuccessful outcomes. If you want to teach children to succeed in society, you need to teach the opposite of what public school "socialization" teaches.

You think adult society is like school? This author clearly disagrees with you: http://www.paulgraham.com/nerds.html

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