John Oliver And Homeschool: A Bad Take

Alleged comedian, John Oliver, hosts a show on HBO called Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. About a month ago, he chose to dedicate a twenty-four-minute segment on homeschooling. It was an alarmingly prejudiced, misinformed, and brainwashed diatribe. So, it was exactly what one would expect from a far Left “comedian.” Normally, I’d roll my eyes and move on, but Oliver is not the only one who views homeschool in this light. In fact, his criticisms are unoriginal and frequently hurled at homeschoolers by most naysayers. John Oliver and homeschool…I never thought I’d pair them together, but here we are. We need to examine Oliver’s arguments and prepare ourselves to respond to them in the real world because they will definitely be used against you at some point.

John Oliver And Homeschool: Does He Know What It Is?

In only twenty-four seconds, Oliver demonstrated his massive lack of homeschool knowledge by beginning his segment with an incorrect homeschool definition. He claimed that families in America were forced to homeschool during the pandemic-that-shall-not-be-named. Actually, Mr. Oliver, families were not forced to homeschool.

Some parents chose to pull their children from public school and homeschool instead, but no one had to do that. Oliver is referencing the distance learning that schools offered/required while our nation’s schools were closed to in-person classes.

Each state has slightly varied laws concerning what legally counts as homeschooling and how one can accomplish that form of education. However, no state considers students who are enrolled in public school and completing public school course work to be homeschooling. Even when a student is completing school at home, she is still not homeschooling if the public school is dictating her education.

I had chickenpox in second grade which required me to stay home for two weeks. According to John Oliver, I was homeschooling because I completed my work at home under my parent’s supervision for the duration of my quarantine.

If he can’t even identify real examples of homeschooling accurately, I’m apt to disregard what he has to say on the subject. But let’s give him a chance. Perhaps he misspoke.

John Oliver And Homeschool: Whites And Christians Need Not Apply

Oliver had plenty of criticism to offer homeschooling, but he also admitted that there are legitimate reasons to choose homeschooling over public school. These John Oliver approved reasons include: social and health struggles, safety concerns, military families who frequently move, and Black parents who don’t want a “whitewashed” curriculum or disproportionate criminalization because of their child’s skin color.

You may notice that none of the reasons are religiously based. That’s because John Oliver scoffed at right-wing Christian homeschoolers. He inferred that faith and a rejection of Leftist agenda are not valid reasons to homeschool when he contrasted those homeschoolers with those who have “legitimate” reasons to home educate.

Christian curriculum didn’t miss out on Oliver’s mocking tone and dismissiveness. He seemed truly troubled by the Christian-based curriculum some homeschoolers use, but I’m not surprised seeing as he isn’t a Christian. What could he say about faith-based curriculum that any believer should take seriously?

For instance, he didn’t like that one curriculum called out liberalism as a major factor in society’s decline. And shocker…John Oliver didn’t agree with the biblical creation account either. He probably thinks his jokes at our expense are making his point, but they are really proving homeschoolers’ point. Oliver thinks and believes like most people. Are these the people we want teaching our kids? Is this the worldview we should use as the foundation of our children’s education? Of course not! All the more reason to homeschool.

“Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.”

Psalm 1: 1-2 (ESV)

By the way, if you’re looking for Christian homeschool curriculum, may I recommend:

My Father’s World?

Foundations in Faith by Israel Wayne?

John Oliver And Homeschool: Cherry-Picking The Bad Apples

According to Oliver’s sources, there are approximately two million homeschoolers in the United States. Out of all those families, he chose to highlight the negative examples. Yes, as with everything, there are undoubtedly bad examples. But where were the successful and well-adjusted families? If you only get your information from John Oliver, then you’d think there aren’t many at all.

The first example he offered as a warning for the dangers of homeschooling was a young woman who shared her school schedule. The schedule was mostly chores with some Bible and math. Admittedly, this isn’t a proper way to educate one’s children, but without context, I can’t be sure the schedule was insufficient. (Though, I’m assuming it was based on the information provided.)

The other example Oliver provided was an online group called Dissident Homeschool. The founder of this group wanted to create a place for homeschoolers to acquire resources to help raise Nazis and teach Nazi ideology. Oliver and the rest of mainstream media used this group as an example of what happens when parents are allowed to dictate their children’s education. In reality, this group is shunned by 99% (Note: made up statistic) of the homeschooling community. Nazis don’t represent most homeschoolers. Not even close!

Public School’s Rotten Apples

Sadly, hateful rhetoric, racism, and a substandard education are not uncommon in public schools. The argument, though implicit, from Oliver is that homeschoolers are at a higher risk for a poor education and odd or even damaging ideologies, but public school is filled with these influences. You see, it isn’t the government’s job to micromanage parents and tell them how to do it well, and the government doing that is even more absurd when you realize they can’t do it well in the schools they do control.

Don’t Believe Me?

The National Home Education Research Institute (NHERI) shared some interesting findings in 2023.

1. “The home-educated typically score 15 to 25 percentile points above public-school students on standardized academic achievement tests.”

2. “A 2015 study found Black homeschool students to be scoring 23 to 42 percentile points above Black public school students.”

3. “Homeschool students score above average on achievement tests regardless of their parents’ level of formal education or their family’s household income.”

4. “Whether homeschool parents were ever certified teachers is not notably related to their children’s academic achievement.”

5. “87% of peer-reviewed studies on social, emotional, and psychological development show homeschool students perform statistically significantly better than those in conventional schools.”

6. “Homeschool students are regularly engaged in social and educational activities outside their homes and with people other than their nuclear-family members. They are commonly involved in activities such as field trips, scouting, 4-H, political drives, church ministry, sports teams, and community volunteer work.”

It doesn’t sound like homeschooling is the unmitigated disaster John Oliver and others like him would have us to believe.

John Oliver And Homeschool: Not Good Enough

Oliver did concede that homeschooling can be a great option in some cases, but he seems to think that those circumstances are few and far between. Additionally, he not only neglected to give many good examples of homeschooling, but he also mocked parents who do a great job. Specifically, Oliver turned one father’s willingness to do labs in his kitchen, including dissecting a sheep’s eye, into a running joke. Rather than applaud the father for doing something many of us would be unmotivated to include in our science lessons, he teased him for choosing the kitchen for his lab location.

The only homeschool family he spoke positively about is a Black family that made an amazing song about the alphabet. It’s seriously entertaining, and those parents are all in on the learning process. But given Oliver’s list of legitimate reasons to homeschool and overall concern with minority interests, I’m a little jaded about why he supports that family. Is it because they’re Black? I hope not. That family’s video is amazing. Full stop. No racial identity needs to be at play for that conversation. With John Oliver, though, his motives feel suspicious.

John Oliver And Homeschool: Kids Aren’t Safe At Home

The bottom line in John Oliver’s homeschool segment is that homeschool parents use homeschooling as a cover to abuse their children. Most states require very little oversight. Some don’t even require notification that there are homeschooling children in the home. I love this freedom, but unregulated homeschooling is a danger from Oliver’s perspective.

He argued that tighter regulations safeguard children from abusive parents because there would be more eyes on the family. Current child protection laws, as Oliver pointed out, rely on kids being in school surrounded by mandated reporters. His mic drop moment about unsafe parents was, “Having a child does not inherently make you virtuous.”

He’s right. Parents don’t become “good people” because they have children. However, let’s not forget that a job doesn’t make someone virtuous either. So, allow me to change his quote a bit. Being a teacher or school staff does not inherently make you virtuous.

Are kids statistically safer at school? I don’t think so. School shooters, gangs, and bullies come to mind immediately. And the staff isn’t always who you want around your children either.

Wolves In Teachers’ Clothing

Some news cycles seem to be littered with endless stories of teachers caught in a sex scandal with a student. It used to be easier to ignore this sort of thing as a problem “they” have and continue to defend our own excellent schools. These days…not so much. Just a couple of weeks ago in my neck of the woods a paraeducator was charged with three counts of sexual assault of a student by a staff member. The incidents include him giving the student alcohol and a video recorded in his bedroom. Parents and teachers declare it could never happen in their schools, but the fact is that these things do happen. No school is immune to the possibility of a predator.

According to Fox News, approximately 350 public educators were arrested in 2022 for sex-related crimes. (I wonder how many weren’t caught.) Some of the more nauseating charges included grooming, child pornography, and student rape. Of the staff facing charges in 2022, 290 were teachers, 5 were principals, and 3 were assistant principals. These are among the most educated and trusted adults in a school building, are they not? These are the people we tell our kids to go to when they are in need of a safe adult. Perhaps we’re just rolling the dice with that advice.

Most important to note is that at least 75% of these crimes were against students.

I’m not here to badmouth teachers, though. Instead, I want you to see that public school oversight isn’t necessarily the saving grace John Oliver suggests.

The Failure Of Mandated Reporting

I was a social worker in public schools for three years, therefore, I was a mandated reporter. My husband also worked as a teacher for about fifteen years, making him a mandated reporter, as well. In our experiences, mandated reporting, though important, is not as effective as people think. For one, many people who should be reporting suspicious observations simply don’t. Even though it’s anonymous, they try to stay out of it because they can’t prove anything 100%. Others try to have someone else, often the social worker, make the call. That might seem all right, but that third party isn’t able to answer questions from Child Protective Services (CPS) as well as the teacher who witnessed something.

Here’s the biggest issue… CPS doesn’t usually do anything. They take the call, and then they decide whether or not to move forward. CPS is understaffed and overwhelmed, meaning they need to be judicious with their resources. I have been personally told on a phone call that they would not pursue an investigation concerning an elementary aged girl who frequently saw and/or heard her mother having intercourse with men professionally in their home. Why? There were even more serious cases to deal with than that one.

It’s also important to mention that many of the abuse and fatality cases people blame on homeschooling did not occur in a vacuum. There was often some level of CPS involvement, but it didn’t go anywhere. I’m not blaming CPS. They’re doing the best they can with the resources they have, but the system needs to improve.

We should also note that there are kids in schools right now who are abused at home and no one knows. The mere presence or involvement of CPS and/or the school district doesn’t necessarily help children in abusive homes.

The abuse argument against homeschoolers sounds like a slam dunk at first, but with any amount of critical thinking, we discover the issue is far more complicated than just “we need adult supervision for homeschool families.”

John Oliver And Homeschool: How Dare HSLDA Protect Homeschooling

Oliver assured his viewers that homeschoolers don’t have anything to worry about regarding their rights and freedoms, but he also obviously can’t stand the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA). You know…that’s the organization that protects homeschool rights and freedoms. His three biggest complaints are that HSLDA is Christian, political in ways he deems inappropriate, and it opposes homeschool regulation.

Christian?!?!

All right. The Christian thing. What can anyone say about that? HSLDA was formed through necessity in 1983 by Christian homeschoolers. At the time, most homeschoolers were Christians, so a legal group forming with a Christian foundation isn’t exactly the most shocking revelation. If secular homeschoolers want to create a group, then they should go for it. Who’s stopping them?

 Stay In Your Lane, HSLDA

As John Oliver sees it, HSLDA has no business in political matters. Despite Oliver’s thoughts on the matter, the organization’s leaders have fought for the pro-life movement and against LGBTQ+ laws (e.g., same-sex marriage). Well, by his logic, actors should stop speaking out for political agendas, too. This, of course, should include him. I mean, what does being a comedian and television personality have to do with politics?

HSLDA is primarily about homeschool freedom, but a Christian group which is concerned with the well-being of Christian families will unsurprisingly fight against murdering the unborn and legislation that destroys the family unit. Christians care about a multitude of things. We’re funny like that.

Regulations And Oversight

HSLDA consistently works to protect homeschool rights. Their employees’ consistent advice is to give no more than a state asks for regarding regulations and to follow your individual state’s laws. HSLDA regularly assists homeschool families as they deal with school districts, CPS, employers, etc. with homeschool discrimination or ignorance, and that’s enough to keep them quite busy. But then there’s always a congressman to deal with.

It seems like every year various legislators attempt to pass laws affecting homeschoolers. Often, though not always, the legislation attempts to limit homeschool rights and freedoms with new regulations. So what? What is Oliver’s problem with HSLDA fighting against new homeschool legislation? His concern is that the lack of regulation will lead to child abuse and death. However, I’ve already gone through how complicated that situation is and how that claim is inaccurate.

As HSLDA explains it, and many homeschoolers agree, regulations will do more harm than good. Think of it this way. In what area has the government taken a level of control and introduced regulations without overstepping and making it worse? This isn’t a rhetorical question. I really want to know because I can’t think of one thing. If homeschoolers want the government to tighten its grip on them and squeeze out their freedoms, then the first step is to adopt some “helpful” regulations.

Final Thought

John Oliver didn’t offer any new criticisms or concerns about homeschooling, but his narrative is a threat because he has a massive audience. With a quick online search, you’ll find that his viewers believe he has enlightened them to the evils of homeschool. He’s even persuaded some who were considering homeschooling to decide against it.

As a homeschooler, I understand that I need to be able to answer questions about my decision to pursue home education and to stand strong in my support of homeschooling. Don’t make it easy for your critics to tear you down. Know why you homeschool, and defend your rights and freedoms when necessary. Don’t let the John Olivers of the world speak for us.

How would you respond to John Oliver?

This is the John Oliver segment on homeschooling. Be advised. The language and humor are adult at times.

Image courtesy of Annie Spratt via Unsplash.