Queso Burro

Supreme Court opinions, the president’s immigration executive order, homeschooling controversies, and the longterm cultural effects ...

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Supreme Court opinions, the president’s immigration executive order, homeschooling controversies, and the longterm cultural effects of coronavirus. David and Sarah have thoughts.

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  1. Avatar photo
    Philbnichols

    QuesoBurro, not Queso Burro. And, not a chip side and a dip side, but the little saddles have to have all options on both sides. Just IMO

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    Bill

    Regarding the cultural segment discussing home ownership: It seems to me (as a parent of a pair of early 30-something children) affordability of anything is simply a matter of economic prioritization. Perhaps there is a relationship between prioritizing near-term gratification (renting cars, homes, apartments; spending on music, travel, entertainment, restaurants ...) and inability to "afford" something such as a house.
    If your priority is impressing your peers with your shiny new car, or beautifully furnished apartment or latest ski trip to Colorado, then please stop whining about how the "American Dream" of home ownership was stolen from you by those evil boomers.

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    Julia

    Here's another homeschooling bucket to ponder: https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2018/05/black-homeschooling/560636/

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  4. Ted Lehmann

    After hearing several journeys into homeschooling in the past week or so, it strikes me that they share a common thread suggesting that education is THE most important function served by schools. It ain't! A large element of elementary and intermediate schooling serves a significant custodial function for parents, which has become ever more important with the decline of the multi-generational family and the two job imperative for, especially, young and striving parents has arisen. Schools provide a relatively safe place to house one's children while everyone else works.

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      Julia

      School is primarily daycare. I think if we were more honest about that, that would help us get better outcomes.

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    Brian Levy

    As I understand it, donkeys protect goats from coyotes, so Sarah's business plan checks out in multiple ways, but I hope she never leaves the Dispatch for that career.

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  6. ROBERT

    Right about the 37 min mark David hit on a point very important to me and one I've been thinking about for awhile: providing maximum school choice options, access, and availability to all kids, regardless of socioeconomic situation.
    I've never thought of this from the frame of social justice. But I agree with David, it could be a major opportunity for conservatives- to push for this type of social justice.

    My two sons have required a lot of educational flexibility and diversity- lots of trial and error. And they've benefited greatly. But my kids are fortunate: we've always had great health insurance and my wife and I have always had professional jobs that have allowed us the flexibility to intervene when required. Those two things are big reasons why my sons made it through successfully.
    But I have to believe there are many kids who've never had the resources to access the options we have- but could greatly benefit from access to alternative learning environments.
    Sounds like a very worthy idea to explore further. I would love to hear and read the thoughts of others.

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  7. PM

    Salsa burro anyone?

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      Philbnichols

      A QuesoBurro will necessarily include a wide range of dips. Kind of like Taco Bell doesn’t just serve tacos.

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    Aquamarine

    I really like the Advisory Opinions podcast, especially as a fellow non-practicing attorney (in Texas, Sarah!). I enjoyed the discussion on homeschooling, but I wanted to push you both on a couple of points.

    First, I take a small issue with the concept of homeschooling "buckets" generally. Characterizing the reasons for homeschooling into categories in this manner treats public/private education as the default, not only in the sense that it is more common, but also somewhat in the sense that public/private schools are the best choice for *most* kids/families--with the corollary that a specific rationale must be provided for a family's choice to choose otherwise. Some states, such as Virginia, actually make a homeschooling family choose between being "religious homeschoolers" or "secular homeschoolers," with separate requirements for each.

    But I reject the proposition that public/private institutions are the default *best* educational environment for most children. Children attending the specific type of schools we have today is much more a cultural norm than a norm of the human condition or experience. Sarah got at this to some extent by offering the "4th bucket", which I guess is sort of meant to encompass all *other* reasons for homeschooling, but even the pursuit of a hippie/unschooling type of education is presented a bit like a "defense" of homeschooling--an adherence to a particular educational model as a matter of conscience.

    I would suggest that, while a family may indeed have one or many reasons for homeschooling, we should not even culturally expect a family to provide justification or rationale for that choice. A family sending children to public school, a charter school, a private/parochial school, is not expected to provide a reason for *not* choosing homeschooling or one of the more conventional options. But I can attest that, as a homeschooling parent, there is often a cultural expectation (if not a legal one) that we must provide good reasons for choosing not to take the more popular paths.

    One of the many reasons our family homeschools is simply that we do not want our lives dictated to by the structure of a school's daily and annual schedule. We do not want to wake up early and rush around in the morning to make a 7:45am drop off time. We want our children to have more unstructured time, which is difficult if they are at school all day and then have activities like sports in the evenings. We want to be able to travel whenever the cost is lowest, rather than when the school says that we may do so (which is also when it is more expensive and may therefore not be feasible).

    This scheduling aspect is certainly not our only reason for homeschooling, but I submit that it is entirely sufficient and as good as any reason. There is simply no evidence that public/private schools are so clearly the best default educational model that it justifies forcing our family to structure our entire lives around a school's daily schedule and calendar. When you think about it, though it is the norm, forcing millions of families to build their lives around an externally imposed schedule is actually quite an invasive intrusion into family life. But most accept it without question because it is so very much the cultural norm.

    My second point is much more brief. I believe David made the comment that religion is still the reason for homeschooling for a significant majority. My anecdotal experience is that, while the majority of homeschoolers are religious, most would say that religion is not their primary or main reason for homeschooling, but is one reason among many. Also, based on the Facebook groups I see, secular homeschoolers are growing in number more quickly now than religious ones.

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    1. ROBERT

      Would love to see the when making the school choice is viewed from the same lens as any other parenting decision: where to live, how to discipline, use of the internet, etc. On those issues, it is pretty much expected that parents will have a whole range of views on each of them. Why should school choice be any different?
      There should not be more of a reason to justify that decision compared to the others.

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        Aquamarine

        Yes, exactly, Robert!

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    Pastorfbt

    Sorry, you lost me at self-driving cars. The steering wheel? "From my cold dead hands..."

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    Nathan

    As luck would have it, I finished rereading On Liberty yesterday.

    "A general State education is a mere contrivance for moulding people to be exactly like one another: and as the mould in which it casts them is that which pleases the predominant power in the government, whether this be a monarch, a priesthood, an aristocracy, or the majority of the existing generation ​in proportion as it is efficient and successful, it establishes a despotism over the mind, leading by natural tendency to one over the body. An education established and controlled by the State should only exist, if it exist at all, as one among many competing experiments, carried on for the purpose of example and stimulus, to keep the others up to a certain standard of excellence."

    Mill had a high estimation for diversity of thought, as do I, and as I think you do too. Home education is a wonderful tool for that goal. I think treating the government schools as the "default" is a big error, though not one that I heard on the podcast.

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