GIFT OF HOME-SCHOOLING: ADULT HOME-SCHOOL GRADUATES AND THEIR PARENTS CONCEPTUALIZE HOME-SCHOOLING IN NORTH CAROLINA

Although still a marginalized practice, home-schooling is on the rise internationally and across socio-economic groups. Moreover, the current Covid-19 pandemic has shifted additional attention to home-schooling. However, much of the available research is primarily concerned with the current day-to-day practice of home-schooling and little attention is paid to adult home-school graduates. This exploratory study, based on qualitative interviews with mothers and adult children from 12 families, examines young adults’ overall evaluation of their past home-schooling experience and aims to understand how parents and children view the pros and cons of home-schooling in hindsight. The data analysis revealed that home-schoolers approach education more broadly than focusing strictly on the academic side and it identified the common theme of “gifting,” which challenges the prevailing conceptualization that home-schooling is a “sacrifice.” Respondents viewed their home-schooling experience as a mutually beneficial process of giving and receiving rather than a unidirectional act of “sacrifice.”