comment: >
  
  I disagree with everything you've written
context: Now THIS is an unpopular opinion lol >
  
  Because its wrong. 
  A lot of studies show homeschooled children have trouble socializing and their education is pretty much directly tied to whether or not their parents hired an at home teacher. >
  
  My first thought is that homeschooling success is largely dependent on the parents… their commitment to it, their own level of education, and understanding of the subject matter. If you don’t hire a home teacher and are truly doing it yourself, if you don’t understand the material how can you teach it to someone else and hope they understand it… >
  
  I was going to say, I imagine there's a bias if such research exists since homeschooled kids are often from homes where the parents are passionate about teaching, or are/were teachers themselves. They're also likely affluent enough in order to afford to have a SAH parent or hire an at-home teacher, thus we can extrapolate that they are likely well educated themselves if they can afford such luxuries. The majority of the populace is not that well off or well educated to teach their own kids. Just look how "smart" the average population is and we were all taught more or less the same thing. 
  If you allowed parents to make the choices about what to teach their kids, there would be no equality/consensus in what is taught and you would have a world full of extremely varying education levels with no standardization on education. 
  Then the only kids in public schools would be ones from poor families, which would be underfunded and treated poorly due to their lower status causing even greater social divisions. Education needs to be free and fair in society if we want a chance of any equality. >
  
  Having done the homeschool thing for a bit, I disagree. I think the majority of homeschool parents are choosing it for religious reasons. They often do not have any teaching background. They do not tend to be affluent. Affluent parents send their kids to private schools. They tend to be middle or lower middle class. There’s also a subset who pulled their kid from public school because they have a special need and didn’t feel the school was meeting that need. >
  
  Yep, for every "dedicated ex teacher" or whatever makes them competent and involved (good on them) there 10 families homeschooling because of their cult. >
  
  As a formerly homeschooled student- homeschooling works great only when the parents are diligent about making sure the kids are actually learning and when the kids have regular assessments and testing. My parents truly went above and beyond, and I had a great experience. Not all homeschooling families are like this tho. And to be fair-public schools also only “work” when they have proper funding, good teachers, and parents are diligent. >
  
  In addition it requires the kid to be motivated and curious.  It can be absolutely awesome.  Usually it is not.  I also think it works better at lower levels, and can be tough in high school >
  
  There are actually a lot of programs for homeschooled students to take AP courses, science labs, etc during high school. I did this and I also took classes at a local college when I was just a teenager, which lowered the number of credits I needed when I started my first degree. Altogether a GREAT experience-10/10 recommend.
  I never would have been able to do either of these if my parents hadn’t actually taken the initiative to learn, or if they couldn’t pay for them, or if had to work multiple jobs. I think money is a big reason public schools need to remain a big option. >
  
  One of my old coworkers actually had her son take college classes at the community college over summers, as they didn't have a GED requirement to attend classes. He ended up graduating high school with an associates degree along with his high school diploma. >
  
  That would require an economy that doesn't often need both parents working full time jobs. >
  
  And parents who take education seriously. >
  
  And parents who are educated themselves >
  
  And parents >
  
  And children >
  
  And stuff to teach >
  
  And atoms >
  
  And my axe! >
  
  There are so many broad assumptions here.
  If a family can afford to homeschool, they can also afford to have a parent home. Maybe the advantages you are seeing tied to homeschooling are really the advantages that economic security provides children?
  Homeschooling would put millions of children whose parents can't afford to homeschool them at a disadvantage. Having an educated public with zero financial barriers to education benefits society as a whole. We all end up smarter, more educated. Even the garbage man or the burger flipper can read. That wasn't always the case before public school was the norm.
  I have seen some very intelligent homeschooled children, and some children whose only literature exposure was the bible, who believe the earth is flat, and who have no social skills. Homeschooling only works sometimes. >
  
  This. I’ve met some very socially awkward homeschooled adults to the point where I could just point that fact out when I first met them. There’s honestly something lacking when you don’t age along side your peers on a consistent basis. As much as I think our public schools are failing the children and private schools are usually a religious cash grab, I think for mental development especially with social dynamics, the child will only learn from exposure which is usually only offered in a standard school setting and is sometimes overlooked when being homeschooled. >
  
  The conclusions about home-schooled versus public-schooled students made in the OP are bizarre and nonsensical. I’ve taught hundreds of home-schooled students, and there is no measure that can be used to justify the claim that they are “better educated” than traditional students. They are generally woefully underprepared, in large part because most people don’t have the training or wherewithal to be responsible for their children’s education.
  I’ve taught for twelve years, and of the 100 students I’ve had who were the most lost, the least capable of growth, and had the fewest “tools,” at least 90 of them were home-schooled. This isn’t an unpopular opinion, it’s just wrong - and probably can be/has been empirically disproven. >
  
  I’m surprised this comment is so down-thread.  Kids who were homeschooled post on the internet all the time about how they were totally unprepared for High School, often having no “general knowledge” of English Lit or Geography. >
  
  I’ve talked about this recently in other unrelated threads, but a few years ago I taught classes at a university that really recruited home-schooled kids from throughout the Midwest. Broadly speaking, their gaps were noticeable and profound, and their attitudes toward education were incredibly combative. >
  
  What university? I was "homeschooled" (unschooled) in the Midwest and am feeling very lost. >
  
  This was at Huntington University in Indiana. I would not recommend that anyone attend it. It is a regressive evangelical diploma mill. They don’t teach anything, they just shove students through (the average time to degree is 3 years) with no curriculum and expel anyone who is queer. >
  
  Just because you are a parent doesn't mean you're smart enough to train your kids academically. No. >
  
  I would be a horrible homeschool teacher if I had kids. I’m good at reading and science so I could teach those okay, but I swear to god I’m like an 8th grade math level on a good day. The last thing my dumb, genetically mathematically challenged kids would need is ME trying to explain how geometry works >
  
  
  genetically mathematically challenged kids
  
  Be careful with telling them things like this. Don't quote me on this, I've read it in The Art of Learning by Joshua Waitzkin (I think) and haven't fact checked, but children who grow up believing success is related to their intrinsic characteristics pefrom worse than children who believe it's attained through practice. There's a whole concept of mathematical anxiety which may cause them to underperform if they're afraid that they're naturally bad at it.
  There's correlation between general intelligence and math ability and there are probably other genetic factors that play into it. But there's no need to emphasize that and make them afraid that they're doomed from the start.
  If they're already in school and struggling, check out Khan Academy, it's a great & completely free resource, helped me a lot throughout school and even a bit in college! >
  
  I don’t have any kids and I don’t plan on it, most likely, but yeah this is a thing for sure. Although there certainly won’t be any rocket scientists coming from my womb 🥲 >
  
  Every home schooled kit I’ve ever met were awkward as fuck. Some of them were good with adults, sure, but they did not represent normal kids. >
  
  I’ve met a lot of them from doing archery in middle and high school and a lot of them were awkward or rude. There were some exceptions but we didn’t expect much when we were paired up with them >
  
  At least its unpopular! On Reddit at least. >
  
  I’m pretty sure this is an unpopular opinion of most people… not just Reddit. 
  I am very biased because I’m a teacher- but I’ve also met a bunch of lazy homeschool parents. Unschooling parents who think it’s okay their 8 year old can’t read, and doesn’t want to learn yet… >
  
  Of all the homeschool parents I’ve known, there is only one who I think is capable, and she was a teacher before she decided to homeschool. She “unschools”, but she is not some fringe lunatic. She’s very thoughtful in the way she teaches kids, is not religious, and has formed a co op.  She has a lot to be proud of and I would have no problem letting my kid learn from her.
  The rest of them have zero business teaching their kids or anyone else’s.