HOME SCHOOLERS ARE GAINING NATIONAL PROMINENCE

Twelve-year-old George Thampy, of Maryland Heights, Mo., distinguished himself the week before last by winning the Scripps-Howard National Spelling Bee.

Thampy is taught at home by his mother along with five of his six siblings. Not only that, but Thampy had been runner-up the week before at the National Geography Bee and had competed at the top levels of the national spelling bee in two previous years. In addition to Thampy, the other two finalists at the spelling bee were also home schoolers, as were an amazing 11 percent of those who made it to the national level competition.

From nearly negligible numbers 20 years ago, home schooling has exploded to include approximately 1.5 million American children. Many of our elite institutions of higher learning are discovering that home schoolers make excellent students who can compete and excel against any others.

Many skeptics or opponents who are unfamiliar with home schooling express concerns about socialization, or the lack thereof, in such an environment. Thampy and others dispel these concerns, and the evidence bears them out. Writing in The Wall Street Journal last week, Thampy described his outside activities:

"I have friends at the church youth group we belong to the Evangelical Free Church. Also, I have befriended numerous former competitors in the National Geography Bee and the National Spelling Bee, with whom I keep in touch via e-mail. ... Just because I don't go to a big classroom full of other children my age doesn't mean I'm lonely. I have brothers and sisters and other home-schooled friends, not to mention Boy Scout friends, and friends around the neighborhood and church. I have no trouble relating to children who go to conventional schools. They don't think I'm strange because I'm home schooled. ... Besides, even they usually seem to know other kids who are home schooled."

As the Journal commented editorially, "Whatever you say about home schoolers, you can't say they're afraid of putting it on the line. How different the approach adopted by our public education mandarinate, which for years fought anything even remotely designed to measure achievement, whether it be test scores, merit pay or performance evaluations."

The evidence is overwhelming, and mounting by the year, that home schooling not only shouldn't be suspect, but that it works and works very well indeed for those bold enough to undertake it.