From the cooler evening weather to the jam-packed “Back to School” section at Walmart, we all understandably feel the pressure to consider Fall plans for our children. There are options aplenty, and the Educational Freedom Account pathway promotion is in full, political, high gear. The EFA is a fourth educational pathway to satisfy compulsory attendance in NH; the other three are public, private and home education. This pathway has separate and distinct laws and requirements, yet the confusion about what it is and how it affects home education is at the center of a widening divide amongst home-educating families.
I’ve spent years and years of my life contributing to the powerful home-education community in NH. I’ve been a part of empowering families to raise, nurture, and educate their own children for well over a decade. From classes, events, info sessions, book sales, meet-ups, field trips, co-ops, consultations, passing on curriculum and books, to my online presence to encourage parents. Part of my life’s work has been to help families proudly take complete ownership of their own children’s education. I spent untold hours and dollars putting this mission, of grassroots connections, into action. I’m not alone.
So when home educating parents started to sign up for the EFA, *capable, wonderful, intelligent* parents, I supported them by counseling them to proceed with caution. I said, “let other people go first.” There’s a whole political machine at work behind the “school choice” movement in NH, and no matter what proponents tell us, the EFA money is government money. It’s taxpayer-funded, and it’s hurting the movement that we have helped build.
We want to thank Amanda Weeden for this Contribution. Submit yours to steve@granitegrok.com
Young moms, who are already under immense pressure to be perfect at *all the things,* are convinced that they need thousands of dollars to homeschool their precious preschooler. This hurts home-education in NH.
The almighty dollar, being chased by both out-of-state and in-state educational providers has left families with a serious case of FOMO. This hurts home-education in NH.
Well-intentioned parents are signing up for programs, classes and “microschools” without realizing that these people and providers are not vetted for basic safeguards – like insurance or background checks, or any educational training whatsoever. This hurts home-education in NH.
Private, small businesses and programs are being asked to “Sign up as a vendor for the EFA, it’s easy!” In reality it’s creating less buy-in from consumers and more space taken away from those of us who need to budget to afford it. High buy-in is good for a free market. Low buy-in creates mediocrity. These businesses are required to provide identifying data to the state in order to become a vendor. This hurts home-education in NH.
This program drives prices UP for everyone. It’s basic economics at work. This hurts home-education in NH.
The EFA program has convinced amazing parents that they can’t do it themselves, that the home-education community is not enough, that *they* are not enough. It’s a government program, with government oversight, that opens a family’s homeschool to the government. We *know* how this will go, dear reader. (It’s not more freedom!)
This is killing our culture, and everything we have been building and fighting for.
If you’re one of the families who was told that the EFA “is the same as homeschooling” or “it’s just a grant” or “it’s your tax money” or any of the other marketing taglines so often used to attract, please understand that it’s not. If you’re one of the families that signed up because of the *enormous* amount of money being offered as a way to have more freedom, please understand that it’s not. Bigger government is never the pathway to more freedom.
If you’re an EFA family, who chooses to use the money to homeschool, I don’t hate you. In fact, I still go out of my way to help *anyone* who asks. If you know me in real life, you know this to be true. There’s a difference between continuing to advocate for my family and the bulk of the home-educators in NH and hating *people.* Do I wish that EFA families who homeschool would understand the implications and consequences of the program on home-education freedom and culture? Absolutely. Am I willing to put my time and talents where my mouth is? Absolutely. Am I “othering” or “being mean” or “elitist/entitled?” No. I’m protecting what is important to me. Parental rights, religious freedom, educational liberty and *families* are important to me. I am not alone.
We don’t need the EFA program to provide a fantastic, tailored education for our kids. We just don’t. The OG homeschool moms who began this fight over 30 years ago – getting approval from school boards and handing in curriculum and tests to the school principals – did it with FAR less resources and community under FAR more scrutiny and judgment. They persevered and paved the way to be free from the systems built to control us. And they are built to control us.
I had an amazing, beautiful, wonderful momma come to an info session recently, and she was nervous to meet me, because she is an EFA homeschooler. She had heard the buzz about how mean I am, and I told her honestly: “Outrage Culture” is alive and well and the only things that go viral, or folks seem to pay attention to, are the political pieces.
Here’s the truth: I’m still the super kind, encouraging, supportive person I’ve always been. Those types of posts, articles or comments don’t get shared, though. The hours I spend counseling scared parents who need help getting their kids back into public school, or driving a free curriculum to families who can’t afford it, or meeting special needs children to help get them plugged in and included – that just doesn’t track with the one article I wrote to poke the Republican bear.
I’m tearing up as I write this, because I’ve been slandered by people who I thought were friends over the EFA, and one thing that lovely momma said has helped me to pick myself up and dust myself off this week. She said, “they obviously have never met you.” I’ve been told that I deserve the backlash and I’m “emotional” and my work is “foolish.” It’s “divisive” and “un-Christian” to advocate for freedom.
So be it. But don’t come at me when my boundaries feel bad. This all feels bad.
I’m off to the beach, and then will keep building and protecting that which I hold dear. We are at a pivotal moment right now for home-education freedom and autonomy in New Hampshire.
Join us in this fight.
