Homeschooling Increases 30% as Public School Exodus Continues
By Movieguide® Contributor
A new study reveals that homeschooling has continued to surge after over one million students left public schools during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Homeschooling saw a 30% increase in 2021-2022 while public school enrollment fell by more than 1.2 million students within the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic,” The Christian Post reported.
The study from the Urban Institute found “private school enrollment increased by 4.3% between the fall of 2019 and the fall of 2021. Data collected between the 2019-2020 school year and the 2021-2022 school year showed that homeschool enrollment rose by 30%.”
“[I]ncreased private school enrollment accounts for roughly 14 percent of the decline in public school enrollment, but increased homeschooling accounts for 26 percent,” Thoms S. Dee, the Barnett Family Professor of Education at Stanford University, explained.
“For every one-student increase in private schooling during the pandemic, homeschooling increased by nearly two students,” he added.
Movieguide® previously reported why parents have pulled their children out of public schools.
“Many parents pulled their kids out of the public school systems after educators and administrators flip-flopped repeatedly on virtual versus in-person learning and mask mandates from 2020 into 2021.”
Many others, following actor Kirk Cameron’s lead, are seeking “the everyday adventures of American homeschool families who are on a mission to put faith, family, and freedom back into learning.”
“We believe that homeschooling is a wonderful way to educate a child and that many hundreds of thousands of families made this same discovery during the pandemic,” Steven F. Duvall, director of research for the Home School Legal Defense Association, wrote in a statement.
Movieguide® previously reported on the uptick in homeschooling in the United States:
After the COVID-19 pandemic forced schools to shut down across the country, parents scrambled to educate their children through other forms of schooling like online or even homeschooling.
Yvonne Bunn, director of homeschool support and government affairs with Home Educators Association of Virginia, said that data showed a definitive uptick in parents looking to homeschool…
Bunn also said that homeschooling offered parents an alternative to an online school that the public and private school systems adopted during the pandemic.
A U.S. Census Bureau report backed Bunn’s claims and stated that homeschooling doubled during 2020. In just six months, the total percentage of homeschooled children jumped from 5.4 percent to 11 percent. The report also noted a steep increase in the number of Black families choosing to homeschool their children.
