An increasing number of parents are homeschooling their children due to a growing disiullusionment with the public school Common Core curriculum.
Heartlander Magazine reports that North Carolina has seen 14 percent spike in the number of homeschooling families within the state. The numbers in South Carolina, Virginia, California, Alabama and New York have also risen dramatically over the past year,
"If you look at national, and even state polls, you can see that the more familiar people become with Common Core, the more they dislike it," Bob Lubke, a senior policy analyst for the North Carolina-based Civitas Institute, told FoxNews.com. "They feel like they are losing control of what their kids are learning."
While many parents choose to homeschool due to the "confusing" and "chaotic" way Common Core math is taught, others do so in fear of the left-wing political agenda they feel the government is pushing through the curriculum.
"Americans have rejected the Common Core initiative because they are tired of unaccountable federal bureaucracy, especially when it comes to their child's education, and because they are seeing first-hand the poor quality and content of the Standards that are meant to prepare children for the workforce instead of giving them a well-rounded, superior education," said Glyn Wright, executive director of the Eagle Forum.
William Estrada, director of federal relations for the Home School Legal Defense Association, said the government is increasingly pushing parents out of decision-making when it comes to their children's education.
"When it comes to Common Core, we see a hastening by parents. For them, it's the final straw after many concerns about the education of their children."
"There's been a battle for a long time, where parents feel that they do not have enough of a say when it comes to their child's education," he added.
The Common Core State Standards Initiative was developed by the State Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers, and has been adopted by forty-three states, the District of Columbia, four territories, and the Department of Defense Education Activity in order to compete for a "Race to the Top" Department of Education grant introduced in the Obama administration's 2009 economic stimulus package.
Earlier this year, the Home School Legal Defense produced a documentary, "Building the Machine," warning parents that the Common Core treats kids like machines on an assembly line.
"Common Core's rigid and technology-laden approach to learning makes individualized education almost impossible," reads a statement on the HSLDA's website.
"The Common Core standards require students to master a checklist of skills every year. Teachers all across the country must teach from the same prescribed list and at the same prescribed pace. This one-size-fits-all approach will supposedly makes children "college- and career-ready," but will it produce young men and women capable of careers that call for independent analysis and creative problem solving?"
Terrence O. Moore, assistant professor of history at Hillsdale College, echoed those fears in a recent interview.
Paraphrasing Plato, Moore said, "Whoever controls ... the narrative controls the politics, the economics, the family, the ways of thinking and the ways of believing. ... The most impressionable people, of course, are the children. So, welcome to the world of the Common Core."
