OUR EDUCATION SYSTEM IS A JOKE

This is something I have felt strongly about since I was going through it myself. Back then, I mostly thought I was just being a brat and difficult and rebellious and that I was just different from most people. I thought this because I HATED school. I could feel how absolutely USELESS the information was, and the fact that the vast majority of it would not be remembered long term, since I had no personal interest in what I was learning. I could barely hold onto it long enough for a test and then I would immediately forget it. I know this was a product of that environment because as soon as I was on my own, I researched the crap out of any topic I was truly interested in and learned vast amounts of information, while actually retaining it all.

I GREW UP LIKE ALL OF YOU THOUGH, THINKING THAT IF WE QUIT SCHOOL OR DIDN'T FOLLOW THE PATH OF PUBLIC STANDARD EDUCATION, WE WOULD BE COMPLETE LOSERS AS ADULTS.

We have all been so thoroughly brainwashed for so many generations that it’s like we can’t even imagine there could be another option. Even though we can see that many of the worlds brightest and richest people quit high school or didn’t attend college. We feel that must mean they’re special though, we could never do that.

And then people started homeschooling more. Growing up we were conditioned to ostracize them. They didn’t live in our daily fucked up emotionally detrimental school environment where we had hierarchies and bullying and exclusion from groups to learn about. Where we learned from the youngest most impressionable ages that above all else, we MUST fit in. We must be like everyone else and not stand out or else we would suffer brutally like those other kids. The kids who couldn’t fit in for whatever reason. The homeschool kids automatically fell into that category, because the only thing we knew about homeschool kids was what we heard. That they would be awkward and unsocialized. Unfit for society. And so the projection of that continued to separate them from larger community activities where they were singled out, left out and just generally not a part of the pack.

FOR GENERATIONS UPON GENERATIONS, WE HAVE BEEN PROGRAMMED WITH BELIEFS THAT WE AREN'T ENOUGH.

Women have been taught that they can’t give birth (one of the most natural processes on earth), without help and intervention. We have been told we can’t rely on our own natural immune system and our innate healing abilities. We have been taught that we can’t have things we want unless we work really hard for them. We have been conditioned to work and numb ourselves most of our days, which keeps us asleep and on autopilot, doing what we’re told. And of course, we have been told that if we try to educate our children on our own we will fail them and they will not fit into society. We have been sold the lie that in order to be of value and make enough money to be comfortable there is no other way than to go to college and pay exorbitant amounts of money. Starting our lives out in debt in a job we end up not knowing how to do (because school never prepares you for how things are actually done in the real world) and the majority of the time end up hating, because we were forced to choose what we wanted to do for the rest of our lives after coming out of a 13 year brainwashing facility that gave us zero time to explore what we actually enjoy doing. We are sold the lie that we don’t get to enjoy life until after our work is done. But then our work is never done is it? By the time we can enjoy what we’ve created we are too old and too tired.

I have had one foot in both worlds for a long time. I felt it and knew it was bullshit when I was there. As a responsible parent, wanting to do the absolute best job I can for my kids, I fell back into those old belief patterns and experienced the pathway of public school again from a new perspective. Our twins have always been well behaved and very good students. They easily conformed to what was expected of them, even if it has perpetuated issues with self-confidence and people pleasing.

SOME CHILDREN DO NOT CONFORM SO EASILY AND THERE ARE MORE AND MORE OF THESE CHILDREN COMING INTO THE WORLD AND INTO THE SCHOOL SYSTEM EVERY DAY.

I believe these children are here to show us how misguided our actions are and how broken our current systems and ways of being are. Some kids will not conform, because we are not meant to conform. Human beings are meant to be unique and to follow their own paths and desires without being judged and beaten down in the process.

Our youngest son would not conform. The more we tried to address behaviors and get him to conform the worse his behaviors became. It took some time to uncover that he had been being excluded and bullied by other kids and reacted by being a bully and pretending he didn’t care. There was a lot more going on, but the point is that I had no idea what stress he was under ALL day long at that place. Feeling like a failure and starting to give up at age 7. It makes me sick to think about it now.

I want you to hear this and hear it well:

If you send your kids to public school, they WILL be abused in some way by either a peer or a teacher, and you will most likely NEVER know. It is such a normal occurence in that environment that your child will just internalize it as something wrong with them and in the vast majority of cases it won't ever occur to them to share it with you. You will NEVER know it happened and you will never know the extent of the damage that this type of mental (and sometimes physical) abuse will cause.

I’ve heard people argue that because humans are resilient and we all have dealt with our childhood wounds and we’re ok now, that they should have those experiences as well, to toughen up to the world and be prepared. How will they handle conflict and pressure in life if they don't learn it early? Wait, WHAT?! You want to create wounding in children to toughen them up to the harsh world? Wouldn’t it make more sense to take care of our children and their mental health so that they know and can wield their own power in this world confidently and without hesitation and eventually make a new and better world?

Why on earth would we send our most valuable creations, our children, away from our homes at 4-5 years old with their little unconscious minds still fully open and spongeing up every experience into their psyche to form who they are? From age 0-7 children don’t have context to file away experiences as memories or to even make sense of them. They are integrated into the child’s personality and become WHO they are. We send them away at this tender age to spend the majority of their days with complete strangers. People we know nothing about, who don’t even have the direct oversight of other adults to keep them fully accountable. We don’t know their views, their triggers or stress behaviors. We have no idea who is taking care of our children the majority of their days between the ages of 4-18! Sounds pretty insane when you hear it like that, huh? You wouldn’t even pick a babysitter for the night based on that little information, but because the government and school system says it’s ok, we abdicate all responsibility. We’ll just blame it on them if something goes wrong. Good plan. Except where does that leave your child, after the damage is done?

IT IS A COMPLETE LIE THAT YOUR KIDS WILL NOT BE SOCIALIZED IF THEY ARE HOMESCHOOLED.

There are more and more kids homeschooling now and they are turning out to be much more grounded and healthy humans than the majority of public school kids. Even if your kids only see you and family and random people at stores, they are still getting socialized in a healthy way. More so really, because they also feel supported and confident in their socialization instead of alone, unsupported and at risk of being outcast and bullied. Now especially, this excuse is ridiculous, because there are so many people homeschooling and groups to meet up with and play sports. The children in these homeschool groups aren’t meeting up and continuing the school soap opera drama from the day either, they are rested and energized and looking to connect, make friends and have fun. Not only that, when else in your entire lifetime have you been in a group of 20-30 people your exact same age? So what exactly are we socially preparing them for?

I’d rather have my child fully unsocialized over being socialized to fit into this crazy world, and socialized to learn to abandon themselves and who they really are for a fake version that’s more accepted by others and fits in with the crowd. Let them dip a toe into that crazy pool once they know who they are and what they stand for; once they are able to contextualize their experiences and realize what is actually happening logically instead of taking it on as trauma and integrating it into who they are.

Knowing all of this I still felt so inadequate that I didn’t dare to pull my youngest from school. How on earth could I keep up with curriculum? There would be so many holes in his education, and he would be at a disadvantage. These were some of the stories I was reciting over and over in my mind. Because I’ve done so much work on mindset, beliefs and creating what we want in our lives, I was able to see these stories for what they were, but there would be so much pressure from EVERYONE else that thought I was making a mistake (my husband included) and I just couldn’t do it. I wanted to, but I couldn’t do it. I KNEW it would be so much better for him, but I was too scared of failing him to make the move. Too scared of everyone else being right and having to not only hear them say I told you so, but to realize that I denied my own child of a true chance in this world.

WHAT A BUNCH OF BULLSHIT.

When 2020 came round and kids were going to be forced to restrict their own breathing in order to attend class, that was the last straw for me. I knew then that anything that I did would be better than that for him. I now had the backing of my husband too, since he also felt strongly about these overreaching conditions being imposed. With his support I felt like I could face the rest, come what may. We made the change.

Carter started homeschooling for his 6th grade year and is now in 7th grade at home. Olivia decided to homeschool as well as a Junior in high school and is in her Senior year now. Everett decided he’d like to mask and stay at public school to be with his friends, and I allowed that. He is old enough to decide for himself I feel. After a full year and a partial year of homeschooling, I have to tell you, I am so glad we did this. It has been the best choice. They are able to learn whatever they want! It took some time for them to decondition from the old ways as well, but they are now interested in learning new things on their own. They are gaining valuable problem solving skills and real life practical lessons every single day that are going to serve them far better than most of the useless knowledge they were being force fed before.

THE MAIN THING SCHOOL TEACHES TO MANY CHILDREN, IS TO HATE LEARNING.

We don’t have to force learning on children, they will want to learn what they’re interested in. We don’t have to make a child learn to walk or talk. They see us doing it and they want to learn it too. This is natural and it works for anything. Any subject. Your child hates math. Great. Leave it alone until he needs it and then have a lesson. He will be actively learning and involved because he sought out the skill. Most of the resistance to school and subjects wouldn’t even be present if we didn’t cause this trauma related to learning in the first place by forcing it down their throats.

There is no consistency in learning between different schools and even between different classrooms within the same school. I love teachers and respect most of them, don’t get me wrong. My sister is a teacher and she’s one of the good ones. But that’s just it, ONE of the good ones. Teachers are held to so many standards and rules and ridiculousness that most of them are unable to follow their hearts and teach in the way they know will benefit the kids. Instead they have to follow protocol and shove irrelevant information down their students throats with pressure to make the test scores good, as if that is an accurate representation of a healthy education. Most teachers have been in this broken system for so long that they feel tired and beaten down. Many give up and start showing up just for the paycheck. Many are so unhappy with their own quality of life and work environments that it naturally spills out onto your children in the form of frustration, unfairness, even mental abuse. I REPEAT: Most of the time you have no idea when this is happening. Your child doesn’t have the context to even realize it’s not ok for them to be treated that way and so it’s normal and acceptable. Not only that but the actual curriculum is vastly different within the same grade. I remember a year my twins were in different elementary school classrooms and one was doing daily reading and spelling for 6 months into the school year before the other was given any reading and spelling work. There were many more discrepancies but it really opened my eyes and I kept them together from then on. I figured if one is going to be at a disadvantage then I guess they should both be? And that really broke my heart a little. The fact is if you don’t have twins you wouldn’t know that your child could be receiving a lesser education than others in their same grade and school.

All this to say that we’re so worried we can’t teach what’s needed, but they aren’t even doing the best job many times and no one really cares, as long as the report card is good. Kids are sent on to the next grade regardless of if they are ready or not. There are kids in our high schools who don't know how to read well or do math and they get to receive a diploma regardless.

There is vast research on how we best learn and it’s very well known information. Our schools do not use this information though, and instead are still using rote memorization mainly and it is NOT effective. They forget the information after the test. Well known, but none of these standards the teachers have to live up to include the proper way to learn things. If you’re lucky though, you might get a good one, who knows and applies this knowledge with their class.

I could go on and on about the things wrong with schools, but if you’ve read this far I’m sure you have a list of your own complaints. The question is, what are you going to do about it? The system is so broken that it cannot be changed or fixed. It’s time to start anew. To disconnect from what everyone else says you must do, you should do, you can’t do, you have to do, and do what you know is right for you and your child. Whatever that is. Trust yourself that it’s the right decision for you, fully decide and then wait for a solution to come to you.

I hear people bitch and complain about things and it’s so easy to blame the school or the teachers or the government or whatever, isn’t it?

THE FACT IS YOU HAVE ABDICATED RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR CHILDREN TO SOMEONE ELSE. IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT, YOU DO HAVE A CHOICE.

Schools can’t make both sides happy when we are divided on so many issues. If you aren’t resonating with school, don’t use the cop out that you have no other options. When you choose something better for yourself or your children a way will unfold, every time. Take responsibility for what we’ve created and either keep it up and keep it going because you love and believe in it, or do something else. Either way complaining is not a worthwhile expenditure of your energy. It just shows that you are powerless and I’m sure you do feel powerless or else you’d have changed things by now.

YOU ARE NOT POWERLESS. WHEN THINGS DON'T FEEL RIGHT, THEY AREN'T RIGHT.

Trust yourself, trust your intuition and make that change if you’ve been wanting to. The more of us that follow the pull of our hearts and make the change the more power we will have as a group to create something new. There is so much support available if you only ask. Homeschooling does not have to look like 6 hours a day in a chair with you forcing them to do things they don’t want to do.

Please explore your options and choose what’s best for you. Even if that’s school. My path is not everyone’s best path and others may have fully positive experiences with education and I wouldn’t advocate fixing something that’s working for you. This is just for those that know in their hearts it’s not best for them. Permission and courage to follow your heart. To make your own path. And join others who are likeminded and doing the same.

The youtube video that inspired this post: https://youtu.be/8xe6nLVXEC0