More on homeschooling...

...this time from USA Today…

The ranks of America's home-schooled children have continued a steady climb over the past five years, and new research suggests broader reasons for the appeal.

The number of home-schooled kids hit 1.5 million in 2007, up 74% from when the Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics started keeping track in 1999, and up 36% since 2003. The percentage of the school-age population that was home-schooled increased from 2.2% in 2003 to 2.9% in 2007. "There's no reason to believe it would not keep going up," says Gail Mulligan, a statistician at the center.

That is great news!

I maintain that the explosion of the internet, message boards, support groups, social networking pages all have helped fuel the homeschool movement, just as it has helped the resurgence in Reformed theology and other movements like headcovering. For example, in many evangelical churches there may be one or two people familiar with and subscribing to Reformed theology. It can seem a little overwhelming when the rest of the church is a weird blend of semi-Pelagianism/Arminianism/Finney-ite revivalism. But go out onto the internet and you find thousands of others who understand and embrace the sovereignty of God in salvation. The same holds true for homeschool support groups that help homeschoolers meet others for support and encouragement.

I sincerely hope that the 3% of American kids being homeschooled continues to expand, but that will only happen when homeschool families speak out on the benefits of educating our children at home and churches start to embrace Christian education, at home and in Christian schools.