The title of the article makes the claim of homeschooling attracting higher income families, which is correlated to my survey that most families at a higher income range would home school their children. However, I also found another study from Department of Education that concluded an equal share of 64 percent "of home-schooled students and those in schools live in households with incomes of $50,000 or less (NCES, 2009). This says to me that there is virtually no difference between home-schooler's and their peers in terms of income. .
Education Level.
The educational level of the parents also makes a difference. Most families that considered home schooling their children have above average level of educations which is about 81% (17 out of 21). The USA Today article states that 46.8% of college-educated parents home-school, up from 4.9% in 1999. Remember that the overall home school rate is estimated to be about 3% of all school age children.(USA Today, 2009).So college educated parents have doubled the rate of homeschooling.
Reason for Home Schooling:.
According to the survey, the top three reasons for parents to choose to home school their children was because of concern about the school environment, to make up for dissatisfaction at the level of education being provided for students in public school settings, and development of individuality. About 81% (17 out of 21) of the survey revealed that they were concerned for their children's well being in a public school environment, which is part of the reason for home schooling. The recent report, "Indicators of School Crime and Safety ": (NCES.ed.gov, 2011) produced jointly by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), Institute of Education Sciences (IES) in the U.S. Department of Education, and the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) in the U.S. Department of Justice, revealed some disturbing statistics. Students, ages 12 to18, were victims of about 1.
