Should homeschoolers be allowed to play on public school teams?

There are scholarships available to homeschooled kids?

That was really an unnecessary personal attack.

Around here the most likely suspects are either hippy-dippy vegan types or pacifist Mennonites. Not too many weird right-wing Christians round here (or I'm one and I haven't self-identified yet).

Yup.

Apparently $600,000,000.00 worth at the first link. I suspect it's just the tip of the iceberg.

http://www.homeschoolbuyersco-op.org/contests-amp-scholarships/

http://homeschoolscholarships.org/homeschool-scholarships/

I don't think that's true at all.

Schools are full of fanatical Christians. I remember having a thread here a while back because Mo was upset about some kids insisting he was going to hell because he did not profess himself to be Christian.

These days most homeschoolers aren't doing it for religious reasons.

My experience with sports teams is that want whoever is a good player with no regard to anything but ability. Mo plays football on a Catholic league and they have never once asked us about religion.

Yes, and from what I've been reading it's from general tax revenues.

The ones in the first link are available to people homeschooled and not. Anyone can apply. They just don't exclude homeschooled kids.

Edit: there were a few offered by religious groups specifically for homeschooled kids. I imagine it was the community pitching in to help send their own to college.

The second one is just for homeschooled kids but compared to the scholarships available to kids with traditional schooling it's completely laughable.

Are they scholarships exclusively offered to homeschooled kids?

Can you tell me where you were reading this?

there are pages and pages to go through of google links of sites that have lists of scholarships available only to home-schooled children - I think you're underestimating what's out there.


Home-schooled children can apply for the first link's $600,000,000 of scholarship funds as well as ones that are specifically for home-schooled children. If that is consistently the case (I'm not reviewing 1.8 million links to check), there may be in fact an advantage for the home-schooled children (as there are scholarships that are not available to traditionally schooled children).

Oh c'mon! It's only 1.8 million links!

There are so many scholarships devoted to a terribly narrow range of people that I don't begrudge homeschoolers a few.

When one of my employees was going to nursing school she applied for hundreds of scholarships that were so narrow in scope that it became a joke to the whole staff.

She's hand me an address and say she needed a reference letter for the "Slightly Overweight Older White Woman Who Died Her Hair Yesterday Scholarship" or the "Woman Who Has Nice Teeth and Two Kids Scholarship".

Our goofy names weren't too far from the truth.

People/groups who offer scholarships can target whoever they want. I've got no problem with that.

I think this statement says more about you than me, Finn.
My kid isn't in any sports teams because she doesn't have time on Saturdays for the games, she's attending language school on Saturdays; that was more important to me than sports. Besides, all the kids have PE every day for one solid hour.

Nonetheless, I see the huge number of kids who try out for various sports and only a few good ones are chosen. That's just how it is!

The ones who are not chosen for sports can always join the chess club. The basketball coach at my high school told me that I would be better off taking up chess.

Interesting discussion, boomer.

I've only ever known two children who were home-schooled & I really hope they weren't typical examples!
The daughters of a then-friend. Their parents decided to home-school their daughters because they didn't want them to be subjected to what they saw as the inhibiting restrictions on their development as those imposed on most young children in big class groups in schools. Nothing to do with religious beliefs, or anything like that.

I think their mother did a fabulous job of educating them at home (she's a teacher). They were bright, wrote & drew beautifully & were possibly even more up to date on "essential skills" than many of their peers in state schools.

However .... BIG however! ... they were brought up to believe the world revolved around them & their needs & had lamentably few "give & take" social skills. In my most exasperated moments (& there were quite a few!) , I could honestly describe them as precious & totally self-centered. Of course this was not their fault, it was the way that they had been raised.

BTW I don't intend for this to be some diatribe against home schooling (I'm sure all parents aren't quite as indulgent as my friends were) but .... if either of those girls was put in a situation were they were treated exactly the same as every other member of a sports (or any other form of ) team, they wouldn't have GOT it.

Furthermore, if their parents felt they were treated unfairly (by their criteria, for their children) the poor coach of the local school team would have more on his/her hands than they'd ever bargained for! What on earth would this have to do with his/her aim of building up an effective team of players in any particular sport?

Apart from all that, I think that school sports teams are meant to reflect the best effort that a particular school can come up with against the competition of other local schools. Teams are meant to reflect the membership of the school community, not serve some other community (or other) purpose.
When anyone can become a member of a school team , then what's to stop schools from recruiting known performers from outside their own school community to be seen as "successful"?
That is not what sport in schools is meant to be about.
The aim surely, is to bring out the best in the students they work with, to bring out the the best in those students working cooperatively together.

Our community teams it was a requirement.

Maybe the alternative is to make it a requirement - change the rules so that is some capacity they need to volunteer - either that or pay some about of money.

I know many public schools that you have to pay at least a portion to participate in sports - the only way the schools can afford to offer it. I am not against that either.

Like I said earlier though - I am not sold either way - it brings up a good arguement either way though.

I know kids that went to private school (catholic) and then went to public school for a special class - I guess the child needed extra help in a certain area that was available in their small private school so the city had to make accomodations. It seems on one side if they make accomdations one way - they would need to make accomdations in other ways as well.

I've also heard of public schools "recruiting" for atheletic talent. More rumor than anything.

There are also many schools that have intermural (sp?) sports - for kids that just enjoy playing on a team and may not be good enough for varsity.

For your future reference--intramural. It means within the walls.

just heard a news report that the nutritional requirements placed on local school board cafeterias have had negative impacts on the schools sports teams and extracurricular activities,revenues are down because kids can't get fast food type foods at the schools so they are going elsewhere, revenues from food sales help fund sports and other activities

I do agree (although maybe not how this is worded) - just because there are alot of kids trying out for a team and some do not make it - is not an agruement - the most talented should make the team. My opinion is it isn't fair that a less talented kid gets a spot. It should be the most qualified.

I agree though on the tax side of things -- that really isn't an arguement - as everyone pays taxes whether they use a particular service or not.

There is a difference - these scholorships are funded by private funds. Same as going to a private school where they can have different requirements than public. You are comparing two different animals here.

I've been tossing this around in my head for a while now but I can't quite get my thoughts to congeal so I thought that I would go ahead and post to see if I could get a start on it....

I think it's kind of great if a school can be a true community establishment -- that the people living near the school have an investment in it even if they don't have a child attending the school.