Nothing Bad to Say

Nothing Bad to Say
By Michelle Dalrymple

At the end of every semester, my freshman composition students must write a final paper, an argument paper. This paper is a culmination of all the styles and practice they have learned during the course. As an added bonus for the final paper of the class, the students have a choice of topics on which to write their paper. Over the semesters, the topics have included censorship, religions, and money. A few semesters ago, however, I put up education up as a possible topic choice.

Within these topics, students can select any aspect of that topic they choose. Under the umbrella of education, students have written about school funding, banned books in libraries, and special education classes. Inevitably, one student will want to approach the topic of homeschooling. Honestly, I welcome this, regardless of the approach (pro or con), with open arms. I can often offer some resources to help them in their research. Plus, students have come up with sources I am not familiar with or present information in a unique way.

Usually, students will take a pro-homeschooling approach. One student who did so was a quiet girl who had been homeschooled herself, so the topic was within her purview. She was able to add some more personal information that worked well in her paper. However, most students who decide to write on homeschooling are not familiar with the subject at all. This makes for some interesting research and conclusions on behalf of the student writer.

Of course, there are the students who decide to write the contrary. One student in particular did a more than fair job looking at homeschooling as it lacks in “experiences” that schools can provide. I gave her full credit, not only for writing a decent paper, but she also knew that I homeschooled my children; she was not afraid to face the beast.

This past semester took the homeschool debate in our class to a whole new level. A student was intrigued by the homeschool conversations she had heard, and she wanted to write about it for her final paper. However, she wanted to look at homeschooling from the other side and write about how homeschooling is not as good as conventional schooling and does not produce “good” results.

I told her to have at it. I had researched some information, typical arguments, about the “downside” to homeschooling. I had no doubt she would utilize at least some of these sources as the basis of her paper. I also knew that some students in the class had personal experiences with homeschooling, so I wanted to see where this was going to lead.

The students had a week to come back with their formulated theses and some examples or sources for the final paper. When we met that next week to discuss the final papers, she raised her hand to volunteer her thesis and information.

“No offense to anyone in this class who homeschools,” was how she began and I laughed and gave the class a warning “uh-oh!” Then she continued.

“I can’t write on the drawbacks to homeschooling,” she told the class. “Everything I have looked at and researched tells me that there are none. That home schooling is so much better than public schools! I can’t find anything!” She seemed happily surprised at her conclusion, and the class gave a surprised laugh as well.

I then pointed out that maybe she didn’t need to apologize to the homeschoolers in the class; maybe the “no offense” should have been directed at those in the public schools. After more lighthearted laughter, I did let her know that there are sources out there to the contrary, and if she wanted, I would help her research her topic.

She brushed it off with a wave of her hand and let me know that would be way too much work (ha ha, the teacher in me thought). She had already thought of a different education topic and was ready to present that. As it turns out, she wrote her paper on the benefits of homeschooling over public school.

As we continued, I couldn’t help but think of what an impact that was. One would think that public schools, organizations like the teachers’ unions, and the media would make that information readily available. On such a controversial topic as homeschooling, while there are some significant theoretical debates, there were no concrete facts or resources to support anything “negative” about homeschooling. In fact, there was only the opposite. There was so much of the opposite, that when looking for the bad, this student could only find good.