Research on Homeschooling Tells Us Plenty about

Relative Success in College and Adulthood Despite the Claim It Does Not

Click Here To Unsubscribe

Hello, , from NHERI and Dr. Ray.

The Context

Thirty-five years of research generally shows positive outcomes associated with the renascence of millennia-old home-based education. Even within the last few years, however, negative critics of homeschooling and of homeschool advocacy have claimed that research on homeschooling tells us almost nothing. At times, the criticism of positive claims about homeschooling’s effects has been softened. For example, consider the following:

Those claims [“that homeschooling ‘works’ and ‘leads to’ desirable outcomes”] might be true but cannot be supported by analyses of extant empirical evidence.[1]

Without debating whether these writers’ claim was true five years ago, is there any recent information that tell us anything definite about homeschooling and its effects? Yes, and it reveals more than many critics appear to want to admit.

One Recent Review of Research

In recent editions of this research news service, I pointed out that the peer-reviewed Journal of School Choice published my manuscript entitled “A Systematic Review of the Empirical Research on Selected Aspects of Homeschooling as a School Choice.”[2] The purpose of the article is to give the demographic characteristics of the U.S. homeschooling population and the reasons that parents choose to homeschool, summarize the findings of studies on the homeschool learner outcomes of academic achievement, social development, and success in adulthood, and propose future research on parent-led home-based education.

One of the unique aspects of this review of research is that only peer-reviewed sources are noted and included for the aspect of the review that deals with the selected learner outcomes of academic achievement, social development, and degree of success in adulthood. In this, the purpose is to compare homeschool students to those who were educated in conventional or institutional schools such as traditional public, charter, or private schools.

This is the first review of homeschool research that I know of to use this approach. Using only peer-reviewed studies enhances discipline and consistency in the review. It reduces the opportunity for the reviewer to be arbitrary, capricious, or biased in what is selected for inclusion. Further, it theoretically enhances the methodological soundness of the studies included in the overview, and thus makes the conclusions based on the data more dependable.

In earlier news articles, I covered two learner outcome, academic achievement and social and emotional development, that were addressed in my Journal of School Choice article. Here I will cover the topic of the relative success of the home educated in college and adulthood in general. Many call this the, “But-how-will-they-do-in-the-real-world question.”

Research Evidence on the Homeschooled into Adulthood

My literature search resulted in 16 peer-reviewed quantitative studies for

inclusion for the topic of on the relative success of home-educated people who had moved on to adulthood, whether in college or life in

general. Several topics were addressed by researchers, such as agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness, extraversion, neuroticism, anxiety, life satisfaction, political tolerance, holding positions of leadership, GPAs (grade point average) in college/university, SAT and ACT college-admission scores, and college retention.

Eleven of the 16 showed positive outcomes for the homeschooled compared to those in conventional schools. One study found positive outcomes for conventional school students compared to homeschool students. Finally, four of the studies found no significant difference between those from homeschool backgrounds and the others from institutional school backgrounds. Key details of these studies are presented in Table 3 of the report.

In the journal article, I provided illustrative descriptions of some of the studies. For example, Cogan’s (2010)[3] was one of the first tightly designed comparative studies. The dependent variables were first year GPA, fourth-year GPA, retention, and graduation rate and he was able to control for several demographic variables. Multiple regression analysis revealed that the college students who were homeschooled earn higher first-year and fourth-year GPAs when controlling for demographic, pre-college, engagement, and first-term academic factors. Further, there were no differences between homeschooled student’s fall-to-fall retention and four-year graduation rates when compared to conventionally educated students.

A second example dealt with political tolerance. Cheng (2014),[4] in one of the most methodologically rigorous studies to date comparing college students from homeschool and other backgrounds, investigated their levels of political tolerance. He found that “those with more exposure to homeschooling relative to public schooling tend to be more politically tolerant” (p. 64) and students who attended private schools were at least as tolerant as students who attended public schools. Cheng concluded:

Both of the results conflict with the belief that a common system of public schools is essential not only for all students but particularly for religiously conservative students to learn political tolerance. Instead of decreasing political tolerance among students who are more conservative in their religious beliefs, homeschooling is associated with greater political tolerance, and private schooling is not associated with any less tolerance. (Cheng, p. 64)

Summary

After over three decades of investigations, does research on homeschooling tell us anything with distinctness, or not? Yes. Increasingly, research points to positive correlates and effects being associated with parent-led home-based education.

In 11 of the 16 peer-reviewed studies on the relative success of the home educated in adulthood, including college, there was a definite positive effect associated with homeschooled students as compared to students from other educational settings. That is, 69% of peer-reviewed studies in existence at the time of the article’s writing showed a statistically significant positive connection with home education. That is not “nothing.” That is not “we can’t say anything.”

Might fewer positive relationships with homeschooling be found in the future? It is possible. Might some negative relationships be found? It is possible. Might the make-up and nature of the homeschool community change? It is possible. As of now, however, some definite positive things regarding homeschooled persons’ success in the world of adulthood are revealed by peer-reviewed empirical studies.

--Brian D. Ray, Ph.D.

National Home Education Research Institute

P.S. If you would like a free copy of my new research article, please contact me at [email protected] and ask for “the JSC article.”

P.P.S. Your donations help NHERI and Dr. Ray (1) keep up with new research to give you the facts on what is happening in the United States and around the world regarding homeschooling research, freedoms, and insights and (2) be ready to speak to scholars, journalists, courts, policymakers, and parents. NHERI is receiving no tax dollars to do its work and serve the public.

Two ways to help NHERI:

1. Send a check to: NHERI, PO Box 13939, Salem OR 97309 (using a check puts the largest percent of your gift to work at NHERI)

2. Donate online.

Keywords, Categories, Tags: homeschooling, home schooling, home education, home-based education, demographics, academic achievement, socialization, social development, adulthood, college, university, research, statistics, school choice research.

NHERI is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

Contributions are tax-deductible per law.

NHERI, PO Box 13939, Salem OR 97309 USA   www.nheri.org

Copyright © 2018 by Brian D. Ray

Endnotes: