I’ve Been a Public School Teacher for 20 Years. Trust Me: Homeschool Your Kids

by @creation247 (Tweet)

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I’ve Been a Public School Teacher for 20 Years. Trust Me: Homeschool Your Kids

I have a bachelor’s degree in education. I have a master’s degree in music education. I spent 20 years working for the system and taught thousands of students…

And my number one piece of advice to parents is simple:

Homeschool your kids.

And today I’m going to explain why.

Not from the outside. Not from headlines. Not from politics. From the inside. From someone who lived it for two decades.

I want to tell you who a bit about my background because the second you say anything critical about public schools, people assume you’re bitter, uninformed, or pushing an agenda.

I’m none of those things…

Like most teachers who are in the public school system always knew the best part about teaching was the students. They always made my days.

And for a long time I believed that this was a salvageable situation.

I was one of the Kool-Aid drinkers. I worked 70–80 hours a week. I killed myself trying to be the kind of teacher everyone says we need more of. The one that is present, prepared, invested.

And I defended the system.

I told parents it was great. I encouraged people to join the profession. I believed we were doing something noble.

But the longer I stayed inside it, the clearer it became:

Schools aren’t about learning and they are glorified daycare centers.

What Parents Think Schools Do vs. What Actually Happens

I’m going to be fair to parents.

Most parents aren’t dumb. They can tell the system has problems. They know test scores aren’t great. They know teachers are stressed. They know kids are anxious.

But what most parents don’t realize is this:

It’s worse than you think. And it’s worse than you can imagine.

Parents assume when they drop their kids off, something like this happens:

• Their child gets meaningful instruction across the day
• Teachers can teach without their hands being tied
• Their kid is treated like an individual
• There’s order, structure, and accountability

THERE IS NONE OF THIS. ZERO. NADA.

Public schools prioritize compliance and avoiding legal issues above all. They are run like a giant HR department.

Walk through an average middle school or high school classroom today.

You’ll see kids sprawled on desks. Heads down. Talking while the teacher talks. Zero attention. Zero respect. The disrespect is normal now.

And then there’s the other side of it… This is the part parents really need to understand:

SCREENS

Districts are spending your tax dollars putting kids in front of iPads and laptops all day long. Research from the RAND Corporation found that a typical U.S. student spends up to 52% of their school day on a digital device.

That is daycare with a Wi-Fi bill.

What You Are Never Told as a Parent

Parents hear sanitized myths from admin and mainstream media but here’s the unfiltered truth:

• Instruction time is minimal. In many public schools is transitions, disruptions, behavior management, administrative tasks, and time-killing. We homeschool now, and we cover a full day in 1-2 hours. That’s all you need.
• Class sizes force lowest-common-denominator teaching. My wife’s last year teaching, she had 45-48 students per class. That’s unmanageable, especially when many kids lack basic values or structure from home. Even good students suffer because teachers spend all their energy on disruptions.
• Schools are no longer about LEARNING We were told outright: “We’re in the diploma business.” Don’t fail kids; get them to graduation. Pressure to pass students is constant.

FUN FACT: Many districts have minimum grade policies where you can’t score below a 70 even for zero effort.

The Moment I Realized I WAS OUT

In 2019, we came back from summer break for an in-service day. Those are usually painful, but this one changed everything.

The entire faculty was gathered in the gym.

We were told to line up on the court for a “privilege walk.”

Thirty questions. Step forward. Step back.

Questions like:

• Are you white? Step forward.
• College educated? Two steps forward.
• Parents immigrants? Step back.

I knew in that moment that people like me were no longer wanted. White. Highly educated. Independent. Engaged. Thinking.

Ironically, those are often the teachers who care the most.

That day, I knew I was leaving.

That day was the moment I knew: I’m not putting my own child in this.

Why Homeschooling Is the Solution

Homeschooling is the solution because the world becomes your classroom.

It’s one that naturally fuels curiosity and learning happens at your own pace. There’s no disruptions. There’s no woke curriculum. And there’s no Administration HR department making sure that you teach all the right things.

“But what about socialization?”

This is the question everyone asks, and it’s usually asked by people who haven’t been inside modern schools lately.

Homeschooling has grown significantly over the past couple decades. NCES notes the share of students homeschooled rose from 1.7% (1999) to 5.4% of children homeschooled (2020)

Zoom out: the trend is obvious. Homeschooling isn’t a fringe thing anymore. Pods, co-ops, hybrid programs. There are more options for socialization than ever.

And it’s a BETTER KIND of socialization…

What parents don’t realize is how fear-based public schools have become. Trauma. Fights. Chaos. Constant stress.

When you remove fear, learning accelerates.

When the nervous system isn’t in survival mode, the brain can actually do its job. Kids often move faster, not slower.

And as a parent, that’s what you want:

Curiosity intact. Confidence intact. Conscience intact.

This is Your Final Warning

I don’t judge parents who choose public school.

I get it. It’s the default. It’s convenient. It’s what everyone assumes is “normal.” And I was one of the strongest defenders of the system.

But if parents truly understood what was happening behind those walls, a lot of people would make a different choice.

Most parents are simply misinformed.

Understand these are your children and you got one shot to make it happen. One shot at what goes into their minds all day. One shot at the environment that shapes what they think is normal.

So yes: Homeschool your kids.

Because once you see how the system actually works…

You can’t unsee it.

God bless each and every one of you,

Dino