The growth of the homeschooling population has been spurred in part by the goal of parents to shield their children from controversial influences by mainstream schools. The tug-of-war between opposing sides on including God and related theological values in school curriculum and practices is one of the frictions that homeschooling parents had hoped to skip.
For some the homeschooling option offers parents the chance to accelerate quality learning for children. According to Times Live, with mainstream educational institutions tied to curriculum schedules for each school year, learning is not as much of a priority as completing the year's course schedules.
Especially for children who have special needs, the quality of education tends to be sacrificed because of curriculum requirements to varied and diverse groups of students. With homeschooling, parents hope to protect their children from the side-effects of goal-oriented, rather than people-oriented, educational thrusts.
According to The Atlantic, families from conservative Christian background dominated the homeschooling population in the beginning. Christian churches and organizations developed a network that ensured parents adhered to government defined standards of learning in homeschooling their children.
This demographic is reportedly changing, however, with parents opting to divorce homeschooling and religion. The population of homeschooling atheist, agnostic or secular parents and children is slowly catching up with their religious counterparts.
The shift, so far, had not been an easy change to make for homeschooling parents who belong to these groups. Given the dominance of religious networks in homeschooling trends, the references and resources for parents and their children also have religious teachings and values integrated.
The fact, however, remains that religious or otherwise parents hope - through homeschooling - to give their children the best in both educational and values foundations. The number of parents homeschooling their children without God or religion integrated into their education is expected to continue to grow.
