You hear that homeschooling has grown from nearly extinct to somewhat over 2 million K-12 students in just three decades. You also hear that just about no Black families homeschool. This is not true, and more research is revealing intriguing things about African Americans and homeschooling.

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Dr. Cheryl Fields-Smith and Dr. Monica Wells Kisura published their groundbreaking work in an journal article entitled "Resisting the Status Quo: The Narratives of Black Homeschoolers in Metro-Atlanta and Metro-DC."[2] They introduced their piece by documenting that homeschooling is increasing amongst Black families but research on them is scarce. The purpose of Fields-Smith and Kisura's research was to investigate the motivations, beliefs, and attitudes of Black home educators.

They conducted interviews and focus group sessions with a total 54 Black home educators Metro-Atlanta study and Metro-DC. The home educators  in Metro-Atlanta included three single-parent families. The home educators ranged from having no college education to having a professional degree, but the majority the parents held undergraduate degrees. They ranged in age from 26 to 54 years. Income ranges for the two-parent households were median compared to other American families with children. Metro-DC home educators were also in mainly two-parent households. Like in Atlanta, their formal education level was from some college to advance degrees. Their incomes tended to be higher than those of the Atlanta households.

Push and Pull Factors

These two scholars found both "push" and "pull" factors to be motivating these Black parents to home educate their children. One of the forces that pushes the families out of State/public schools is the "... culture of low expectations ... including a lack of rigor in the curriculum, teacher acceptance of mediocre work, and teacher racial stereotyping" (p. 272). Further, these parents believe "... that black male children experienced the culture of low expectations more severely than their female counterparts" (p. 274). One mother reported the following:

     People [personnel in public schools] go overboard, especially with males, with our males. That's more destructive. It's not a perfect world. I don't expect that, but I will take every advantage I can give my kids to grow up with a good sense of who they are in this world ... without other people dumping on them. (p. 274).

A second push factor is school safety, or the lack thereof. "Factors that contributed to the psychology of safety related to attending public schools, in particular, included school climate issues, reports of declining test scores, school violence, and schools not making Adequate Yearly Progress as required by the No Child Left Behind Act" (p. 276). Furthermore, parents were concerned about student-to-student interactions and relationships such as teasing, ostracizing, and bullying.

Several things draw or pull Black parents to parent-led home-based education. Of the two key factors, one has to do with teaching culture. "The ability to prioritize and integrate the African American, or black, perspective within instruction contributed tremendously to black home educators' decisions to homeschool" (p. 277). The parents also said that homeschooling allows them give their children a multicultural perspective of history, rather than a mono-cultural view. The researchers also made a finding that is contrary to the stereotype some hold that homeschool parents over-shelter their children. They reported that "... black homeschool families choose home education in order to provide their children with an international worldview. They introduce their children to these diverse perspectives through their homeschooling curriculum and by exposing them to multicultural experiences" (p. 277).

Conclusions

In wrapping up their piece, scholars Fields-Smith and Kisura offered some stimulating insights. First, they noted the following:

       Black homeschoolers recognized the uniqueness of the present zeitgeist moment. They felt equipped and empowered with the necessary tools and skills to be successful home educators. (p. 279)

Finally, the following observation is rife with implications:

       What this study draws into sharp relief is a rare yet positive portrayal of black family life. Much of popular media and academic representations stereotypically depict blacks as largely living in one-parent, matriarchal, poor, and undereducated households. Contrastingly, most of the families in our studies were overwhelmingly two-parent, well educated, and middle class. In addition to offering this alternative narrative about black family life, this research also suggests that the very existence of black homeschoolers, coupled with their mass exodus from conventional schools is a noteworthy sociopolitical statement. This is what makes homeschooling such a powerful and social declaration for black people. Considered in this way, homeschooling may be the most provocative and courageous act of self-determination and resistance undertaken by blacks since the decolonization and civil rights movements of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s .... (p. 279-280)

Indeed, parents, whether Black or other, choosing to be in charge of the teaching, training, and indoctrination and relationship building of their children - rather than handing these things over to State/government schools - is a remarkable act of self-determination and challenge to the status quo.

--Brian D. Ray, Ph.D.

National Home Education Research Institute

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Endnotes:

[1] Apple, Michael W. (2006, December 21). The complexities of black home schooling. From www.TCRecord.org. Retrieved June 22, 2007 from http://cockingasnook.wordpress.com/2007/03/07/michael-apple-expert-on-black-homeschooling-now/.

[2] Fields-Smith, Cheryl, & Kisura, Monica Wells. (2013) Resisting the status quo: The narratives of Black homeschoolers in Metro-Atlanta and Metro-DC. Peabody Journal of Education, 88(3), 265-283.