With all the hysteria currently surrounding PDJT’s announced decision to reduce the Department of Education to its legal minimums if not to out right end the agency, one would think that the nation’s public school students must be about to face the ending of any chance at a good education. If Illinois is an example of success from the public schools, the Department of Education cannot be ended fast enough.
Home schooling has surged across the country in the wake of the disastrous reaction to the COVID epidemic. Parents found out that their children were not being educated in the public schools but rather they were being indoctrinated. What is the reaction of Illinois legislators to this?
In Illinois, state lawmakers are reviewing a scheme from Democrats that would threaten homeschooling parents with jail sentences if they don’t perform exactly as the public schools demand. In other words, the state is trying to make it as difficult as possible to homeschool kids.
Looking at Illinois stats, I would think the state would be looking for any help they can get to improve the performance of the kids. But, of course, it is not about educating the kids. It is about seeing how much money can be directed by Democrats to teachers’ unions who will in turn send the money back in the form of campaign donations.
In Illinois public schools, two thirds of eighth graders are not proficient in reading or math. The numbers are even worse for black students. Only 16% of black eighth-graders in the state are proficient at reading, and “only 8% of black Illinois eighth-graders do math at grade level.” By many measures, Illinois public schools are the very last place someone would want to send children.
The only way to avoid the failing schools in Illinois is to be affluent enough to attend private or parochial school or to be homeschooled. Illinois has no education savings accounts, no school vouchers and no tax credit scholarships. Illinois shut down a school choice program funded by tax credits in 2024. This is how bad the Democrats want to trap kids in failing schools.
Homeschoolers don’t want the bureaucrats who run failing public schools to come near their kids. The last thing homeschooling parents need is to live under the dysfunctional government’s thumb. Unfortunately in Illinois, that may be what is about to happen.