Earlier this year in San Antonio, Texas, an eight-year-old delivered a fiery, impassioned speech to the office of Republican Sen. Ted Cruz.
Introducing herself as Cari, a third-grader from South Texas, she made a demand: “Stop supporting immigration bills that are hateful. It would harm my friends and people in our community.” She even offered him reading material: “In the Kelly Yang book, Front Desk — a banned book — she says… ‘No human is illegal!’ You should read this book!”
The office hung up on her. Cari called again, advocating for a ceasefire in Gaza. Again, the office hung up. She persisted until — about an hour later — someone finally listened.
In the South, where public schools are increasingly characterized by censorship, book bans, and chronic underfunding, how did this young activist learn to think critically and find the confidence to act? The answer lies not in a traditional classroom setting, but in a current events class at For the Culture Homeschool, an inclusive, secular, inexpensive, and culturally affirming homeschooling cooperative that meets every Wednesday in San Antonio.
In homeschool cooperatives, students learn side by side from one another’s parents — an embodiment of the saying “It takes a village to raise a child.” At For the Culture, parent-teachers introduced Cari and her classmates to the genocide in Gaza and other current events during their weekly sessions, then supported those who wanted to turn the knowledge into action.
Peek’s decision to homeschool was driven by the repeated failures of the public education system to meet her visually impaired daughter’s basic needs despite countless meetings with administration. Neither charter schools nor private schools offered adequate support either. Meanwhile, her husband’s effort to launch a charter school with a student-centered, anti-racist curriculum was blocked by the state for being “too liberal” — a clear sign, she says, that the system is fundamentally broken.
At that point, she chose to homeschool all three of her children, but new challenges arose. Local groups — even secular ones — often lacked diversity. “When you’re the only Black or Brown family or one of the very few, it’s hard to feel safe or seen,” she said. “We felt uncomfortable, out of place, and often tokenized.” Finding progressive curricula that centered marginalized voices and told the truth about U.S. history proved to be another major obstacle. In the end, Peek ended up creating a lot of it herself.
“When you’re the only Black or Brown family or one of the very few, it’s hard to feel safe or seen.”
Everything changed after she met two like-minded parents, Kiah Mitchell Scott and Jennifer Verme. They found common ground at park meetups organized through Facebook homeschool groups. “They were also looking for an inclusive, justice-centered space that affirmed our kids’ identities and gave them room to thrive,” Peek explained. “We dreamed of a space where banned books are read on purpose, where we don’t shy away from hard history, and where our families don’t have to code-switch or constantly explain their existence. A decolonized, secular, inclusive homeschool community where all of our identities are honored.”
Fortunately, their kids liked each other too, and they formed what’s known as a “cottage co-op,” a cooperative run out of their homes.
At the end of the year, parents surveyed their children and found that while they enjoyed the co-op, many wanted to make more friends. The cooperative responded quickly, growing from just 5 to 27 families in a matter of months. Interest was so great that they even had to add families to a waitlist.
The Rise of Homeschooling
Their growth reflects a wider trend. The homeschooling movement is rising in popularity beyond Texas, and beyond its stereotypically white and Christian base. The COVID-19 pandemic paved the way for a new wave of homeschoolers, with rates rising from 2 percent or 3 percent of students in 2019 to 11 percent of families in 2020, before stabilizing to 5 percent or 6 percent of students presently. (Rates vary and are likely underestimated since many states do not require reporting.) Growth has been especially sharp in Black communities, where families are leaving public schools in response to racism, underfunding, and a whitewashed curriculum. The latest wave of homeschoolers is also more likely to identify as progressive, according to one survey.
“We dreamed of a space where banned books are read on purpose, where we don’t shy away from hard history, and where our families don’t have to code-switch.”
Many of these progressive families may not disavow public schooling, and vote to keep public schools funded. Co-founder of For the Culture Jennifer Verme stressed that most of their group doesn’t oppose public schooling. “By and large, our group is not anti-public school at all. We all vote to fund it,” she told Truthout. “Our kids’ needs were not being met.” A survey their cooperative sent out to families found that bullying, racism, and inadequate support for neurodivergence were among the top reasons for parents’ decisions to homeschool.
Some members’ other children go to public school. Kiah Mitchell Scott, formerly a social studies teacher and a co-founder of For the Culture, sends three of her four children to public school. But public schooling wasn’t a good fit for her 13-year-old daughter, she said, who is dyslexic and wasn’t getting the support she needed in that setting. Since joining For the Culture, her daughter has flourished and become more outgoing in its warm and inclusive environment. “Homeschooling is not the perfect environment for everyone, but it is the perfect environment for some,” she told Truthout. “That’s why you need these opportunities out here — for all types of kids to make sure everybody gets what they need.”
More broadly, not all progressive homeschoolers embrace the ideology underpinning public schooling. In the 1960s and ’70s, educator John Holt popularized “unschooling,” a model in which children direct their own educational process while adults act as facilitators or partners. He argued that conventional schooling often quashes children’s natural desire to learn.
Critical unschooling builds on this foundation. In “Toward a Critical Unschooling Pedagogy,” Noah Romero, assistant professor of Native American and Indigenous Studies at Hampshire College, describes it as an educational philosophy that dissolves the teacher-student binary while empowering learners to question and challenge power structures. He argues that traditional schooling systems in capitalist states reinforce colonialist legacies, serving to convince citizens of the state’s authority and necessity while preparing students to become either obedient workers or authoritarian bosses. Romero also cites research from Julius Nyerere, a decolonial political theorist who became president of Tanzania in 1962, which describes how children in Tanzania learned naturally through their interactions with communities, elders, and peers until colonizers imposed formal schooling as a tool of control.
What does unschooling look like in practice? According to The Christian Science Monitor, it often means children waking up naturally, having unstructured days, and diving into topics they choose themselves.
Some unschooling families connect through cooperatives. One such group in the Midwest, which asked not to be named due to today’s retaliatory political climate, meets twice a week in a local forest. There, they emphasize unstructured play fostering a deep connection with the natural world through activities like habitat restoration, gardening, art, and foraging.
The cooperative’s president told Truthout that she has chosen this route partly because she didn’t want her son to associate learning with coercion. “When we first started homeschooling, I asked my son, ‘How did your teachers get you to learn in school?’ and his answer was ‘They just made me or I got in trouble,’ she said. “‘Mistakes are bad, learn this or else’ is not how I want my child to see learning, especially at such an early age. I’m not against public school, I am a product of it myself. But, it’s not the right fit for everyone.” When he’s not at the cooperative, her son follows a homeschooling curriculum at his own pace.
Choosing a setting in the forest or public parks — surrounded by grubs, bugs, mushrooms and other earthly delights — may be ideal for a self-directed learning approach. Educator Cara Kuhl used to volunteer at an indoor self-directed learning program in Fort Worth, Texas, where many students were disengaged and isolated. “What we saw was frustrating,” she told Truthout. “There were islands of individuals with headphones on.”
“Our group is not anti-public school at all. We all vote to fund it.”
That experience led her and Elis Maxwell to found Westside Learning Collective, a drop-off program in Fort Worth, Texas, that combines structured classroom learning with time for self-directed exploration. “We need some structure so that we can build lessons, so that we can help a kid get over that hump if they’re not interested or if it’s hard,” Kuhl said. “So I would say there’s some conventional influences there. And then after that, it’s very open-ended. Self-directed [time] starts right after that, with lunch. They can go anywhere they want, be with anybody they want to be with, and do whatever they want.” During these self-directed sessions, students host impromptu dance classes, create talent shows, write poems, play music, and paint.
While Westside blends structure and self-direction, For the Culture offers its own approach: structured classes that often use project-based learning and draw on the expertise of parents within the community. A parent who is a marine biologist, for example, taught a hands-on course on marine biology. A real estate agent led a class on systemic racism and real estate, examining how housing policy shapes inequality. Mitchell Scott, a former social studies teacher, offered a course on mythology around the world. The educational menu has included everything from Lego Laws of Motion and Junk Drawer Robotics to Recycled Art and Friendship Goals. Families with caregivers that work full time have an option to join For the Culture’s new microschool, a drop-off program with paid staff.
Their approach differs from conventional education, Peek explained, by centering joyful learning, genuine community building and emotional development. “We really try to center joy in our homeschooling experience. For instance, first thing in the morning, the kids do an affirmation that they don’t have to be like everyone else — that it’s cool to be themselves,” she said. After that, the kids go around in a circle, sharing whatever’s on their mind, big and small, for their peers and parents. The confidence they cultivate through these activities is reinforced by the broader network. “It’s beautiful, because when we look at it from the community perspective, I’m pouring into Kiah’s kids. Kiah is pouring into Jen’s kids,” Peek said. “And so not only do they see that support coming from their own parent(s) — they see it from a whole community.”
For parents inspired by this model, the co-founders offered some advice on starting their own cooperative. Verme emphasized the importance of consistency in their scheduling and transparency, suggesting parents photograph their children as they learn to document their progress. Mitchell Scott said parents who start a cooperative together don’t need to agree on everything to work together. Some diversity of opinion, she said, can actually lead to mutual growth. Peek stressed the need to stay grounded in shared values, and to be resilient when facing pushback in conservative areas.
All three co-founders encouraged parents to start small, and to act if it’s what’s best for their children. “If you wait for others to have it, you’ll miss out on the time, because your kids’ educational path and their grown-up years are finite, right,” said Mitchell Scott. “You only get them for a certain number of years, and then it’s the next thing. So, I would say for them to take the plunge, even if you start off small, which I encourage, it’ll give you time to grow and learn as you go.”