More proof of the value of school choice
All those hours that 13-year-old Nathan Cornelius spent scouring atlases and immersing himself in the National Geographic magazine paid off Wednesday – with a $25,000 check.
The home-schooled Minnesota seventh-grader won the magazine’s 17th annual geography bee with a dazzling display of knowledge about cities, countries, cultures and waterways around the globe.
And in beating out 5 million other kids, including 54 other state and territorial champs, he put his little southwestern Minnesota hometown on the map.
It’s a little town, by the way, whose name may have stumped even the other whizzes.
Nathan, a three-time state champion from a town located between Marshall and Granite Falls, knew that Ljubljana is the cultural center of Slovenia. He knew that the Jaffna Peninsula forms the northern tip of Sri Lanka. He also knew that the Atherton Tableland, where it rains a lot, is in the Australian state of Queensland…more
and this…
The impact of homeschooling in these academic competitions goes beyond students who win. Although homeschoolers make up approximately 2 percent of the U.S. school-age population, they made up 12 percent of the 251 spelling bee finalists and 5 percent of the 55 geography bee finalists. Three of the past seven spelling bee winners have been homeschooled. Last year’s homeschooled winner of the geography bee was 10 years old, the youngest in that event’s history. (This statistic is from 2003. More…)
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Before someone goes on some rant that homeschooling is a privilege of the elite, please chill for a moment. I can personally tell you that there is a growing number of black families WHO AIN’T BANKIN’ who are still making this choice for their children. Why? Some of the reasons are school districts (particularly in mostly black communities) have an ongoing success rate of failing our children. Another reason is that gifted children (in my opinion all of them) are not being challenged enough because while the class may be struggling with addition and subtraction, Jamaal is interested in physics. Meanwhile the pundits out there who are against parents having the right to choose for their kids (mind you, many of these pundits have no children of their own–Low blow? Maybe. But it is the truth). And for some of the main ones out there who are against school choice and have kids, a little homework on your part will show you that they have either sent their kids to private school, or currently have their kids enrolled in these types of schools.
The home-schooled Minnesota seventh-grader won the magazine’s 17th annual geography bee with a dazzling display of knowledge about cities, countries, cultures and waterways around the globe.
And in beating out 5 million other kids, including 54 other state and territorial champs, he put his little southwestern Minnesota hometown on the map.
It’s a little town, by the way, whose name may have stumped even the other whizzes.
Nathan, a three-time state champion from a town located between Marshall and Granite Falls, knew that Ljubljana is the cultural center of Slovenia. He knew that the Jaffna Peninsula forms the northern tip of Sri Lanka. He also knew that the Atherton Tableland, where it rains a lot, is in the Australian state of Queensland…more
and this…
The impact of homeschooling in these academic competitions goes beyond students who win. Although homeschoolers make up approximately 2 percent of the U.S. school-age population, they made up 12 percent of the 251 spelling bee finalists and 5 percent of the 55 geography bee finalists. Three of the past seven spelling bee winners have been homeschooled. Last year’s homeschooled winner of the geography bee was 10 years old, the youngest in that event’s history. (This statistic is from 2003. More…)
============
Before someone goes on some rant that homeschooling is a privilege of the elite, please chill for a moment. I can personally tell you that there is a growing number of black families WHO AIN’T BANKIN’ who are still making this choice for their children. Why? Some of the reasons are school districts (particularly in mostly black communities) have an ongoing success rate of failing our children. Another reason is that gifted children (in my opinion all of them) are not being challenged enough because while the class may be struggling with addition and subtraction, Jamaal is interested in physics. Meanwhile the pundits out there who are against parents having the right to choose for their kids (mind you, many of these pundits have no children of their own–Low blow? Maybe. But it is the truth). And for some of the main ones out there who are against school choice and have kids, a little homework on your part will show you that they have either sent their kids to private school, or currently have their kids enrolled in these types of schools.
