Florida Sees Increase in Homeschooling Thanks to Common Core, Testing

As a homeschooling dad I’ve said before that the ONLY positive I’ve seen with Common Core is how it is prompting more families to homeschool.  I’m not one who believes this is the best option for every family, but if you want to make sure your child receives an education that is tailor-made for their personality, learning style, and ability it is hard to beat homeschooling. Which incidentally is the exact opposite of what you get from Common Core and the standardized testing culture present in public schools.

In Florida, like in many other states, the ranks of homeschooling families is on the rise due to Common Core and over-testing. The Tampa Tribune reports:

Last school year, Florida saw the largest increase in home-schooled students in at least a decade, according to the state Department of Education. More than 58,000 Florida families elected to keep 84,096 students out of school — an increase of more than 7,000 over the previous school year.

In the past five years, the total number of home-schooled students in Florida has increased by more than 21 percent, or almost 15,000 students. The last big surge of home-schooled students came in 2011, when about 6,700 students signed up. That was the year after Florida joined a majority of states in joining the divisive Common Core education standards.

Hillsborough County, the state’s fourth most-populous county, enrolled the third-highest number of home-schooled students in the state last school year — 5,560 students from 3,775 families. That’s almost 7 percent of the student population. Duval County enrolled 6,106 students and Palm Beach County enrolled 5,726 students.

Corey McKeown, director of the Tampa-based Christian home school co-op Trinity Homeschool Academy, said almost half the 230 students that take classes of their choosing at school are new this year. Overtesting in schools and the new Florida Standards, which are based on the national Common Core standards, are among the biggest reasons McKeown hears for families leaving public schools. They also worry about increasing violence and bullying in Hillsborough schools, she said.

“There are a lot of families pulling out of the public system because of Common Core, safety issues in schools and wanting to choose their child’s own curriculum,” Mc­Keown said. “We get that a lot with history; they want their kids to know real American history, not what’s taught in the schools. Typically once they pull them out, most don’t want to go back to public schools. Home schooling isn’t something that’s frowned upon anymore.”

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HT: Stop Common Core in NC