Unschooling Grows Up: A Collection of Interviews

A collection of interviews with grown unschoolers, both on this blog and on other sites.  If you're a grown unschooler who'd like to answer a few questions about your unschooling journey, please find out more about how to do so here.  I'd love to hear about your experiences!

On this site:

Hannah Thompson: "My unschooling experience has taught me to follow my passion without restraint."
Anna J. Cook: "The experience of unschooling helped me to remain confident in myself." 
Cheyenne La Vallee: "Everyone has it in themselves to be passionate and motivated." 
Jaclyn Dolamore: "Art and stories are woven through the fabric of every subject." 
Jasmine Carlson: "You don't feel pressured to 'be' something, you are allowed the space and time to create."
Vanessa Wilson: "As an unschooled kid, the world is full of so much that a school cannot give."
Tara Wagner: "Amazing things happen inside of freedom." 
Chloe Anne Spinnanger: "The best thing about unschooling is freedom!"
C. Kennedy: "I was unschooled from the day I was born."

On other sites:

Growing Up Unschooled, Melissa's Experience on Woman, Uncensored
A Lifelong "Unschooler": Interview With Quinn Eaker on Woman, Uncensored
Julian Baptista; Grown unschooler, musician from Enjoy Life Unschooling
Unschooling: An Interview with Everett Bogue from On Top The Cage
Carsie Blanton, Grown Unschooler & Musician (video) from Kelly Halldorson - Unscensored
Interview With Anna Hoffstrom, Part 1 and Part 2, from Mr. Haines
Jason Hunt: Grown Without Schooling from The Natural Child Project (originally published in Unerzogen)
Notes from an unschooled world wanderer from Skipping School

From Life Learning Magazine:

Ilana Ofgang, jazz musician, age 24 
Patrick Meehan, video game entrepreneur, age 29
Laura Brion, musician, urban agriculturalist, age 24
Brian Walton, librarian, age 27
Selina Hunt, industrial designer, age 26
Sarabeth Matilsky, mother, age 26

From Radio Free School:

Cameron Lovejoy: "Is this what I want to be doing the day I die?"
Eli Gerzon: "I love my life."
Unschooler Jessica Barker: "Redefining success."
Brenna McBroom: More time is more freedom
Looking back on unschooling: Kate Cayley (video)
Grown Unschooler Kate Fridkis: Embracing the Weird
Sean Ritchey: Grown Unschooler

From The Unschooler Experiment:

Sean Ritchey: So Many Projects, So Little Time
Idzie Desmarais: Not Alone in the Woods
Courtney Clay: Building a Sustainable Community
Beth Kander: The Due Diligence of Writing for Fun and Profit 
Carsie Blanton: Ain't So Green
Brenna McBroom: Skipping College
Peter Kowalke on the Sociable Unschooler
Brian Walton: How to Be a Librarian
Lynda Young: Second Generation Unschooling and New Zealand Yarn

If you know of other interviews with grown (17 or older) unschoolers not listed here, please pass the link along to me!  Thank you.

Unschooling Gets Publicity...In a BIG Way!

If you're an unschooler, or a homeschooler, or interested in alternative learning, and are even *slightly* involved in any of those communities online, you've most likely heard about the Good Morning America segment on unschooling.

Unschooling has been moving steadily into the mainstream awareness in the last few years.  I've seen a marked increase in people talking about unschooling since I started paying attention to that type of thing a few years ago.  But never have I seen this level of attention.

In case you haven't seen it yet, here is the ridiculously biased, negative, and over-edited segment that appeared on Good Morning America yesterday:



I didn't even finish watching it the first time I tried to.  I just kept cringing at how horribly ABC was slanting things, and just imagining the reactions it would get...

Sure enough, if you read just a few of the 830+ comments on this piece, you'll see just what I was afraid of!  There are multiple lovely unschoolers commenting positively in the comments section, but there are also a huge amount of ignorant, uninformed, and downright nasty comments.  I always attack schools, never people who go to, or went to, school, but even if I did think schooled people were "losers" (discounting the fact I don't think life is about competition, and don't believe you either "win" or "lose", PLUS know a large amount of seriously awesome schooled folk), I can't imagine ever making such vindictive and cruel comments!  Why do people feel a need to do that??  Do they feel better in their mediocre life choices if they can believe firmly and with great smugness that there are people out there who chose MUCH worse paths in life than they did...  Is it because, if they admitted that there were better, more joyful ways of living life, then much of their own life has been wasted?

Today the Bieglers, the family in the first clip (whom I've met, though don't know well.  What I have seen of them has led me to believe that they're intelligent, kind, and caring people!), where given a chance to speak briefly live on Good Morning America, without all the editing.  It was MUCH better!!  They were articulate, passionate, and just did a great job.  I wish they'd been given longer to speak.



Sadly, I'm afraid the feedback from the general public was just as negative.

The first video was on Yahoo homepage (not sure if it still is?).  Twitter and blogs are abuzz with talk of this new-fangled thing called "unschooling" (I keep patiently pointing out to people that it's not new at all!).  I have never seen this much attention paid to unschooling before.

And I have to say, it's kind of scary.

I've been watching hits come in on my blog from people searching stuff life "unschooling cons", "unschooling negatives", "unschooling sucks"...

Suddenly the masses are being exposed to something that challenges everything they've always taken to be The Way Things Are (and The Way Things Should Be).  Many people don't seem to be reacting well. 

Yet, at the same time, I think that publicity is important.  I liked reading some comments from Wendy Priesnitz on Twitter, one of which reads: "In the 70s, people were scandalized by idea of homeschooling; now [they're] scandalized by unschooling. This will pass. Evolution happens."  I really do think that publicity is good.  I WANT more people to know about unschooling, I want more people to understand it, I want more people to accept it, and I want more people to do it.  So how can I be against publicity, even if it isn't as positive as it could be?  At least we're getting the message out there!  And for better or for worse, the message is most certainly out there now.

The Bieglers are going to be on the Joy Behar show on CNN tonight, so you might want to tune into that.

Several unschoolers have written great responses to ABC's portrayal of unschoolers, so I want to share those:

Unschooling Stephanopoulos: Good Morning America Fail From Swiss Army Wife
Unschooling: How Good Morning America Got It All Wrongfrom the Huffington Post
Unschooling on GMA from Child's Play

What do you think of the segments?  What do you think of the huge amount of publicity unschooling is getting?  Does it make you excited to know more people are finding out about it, or scared it just opens things up for stricter government regulations?

Peace,
Idzie

P.S. I'm going through old blog posts and comments and putting together an Unschooling FAQs page...  I figure I've answered so many questions, I should gather it all in one place to make things easier!

A Teenage Brain

Something I have heard oh so many times is that, because as teenagers and young adults our brains are not "fully developed", we are "bad" decision makers, and not to be trusted.  It's a very frustrating attitude, that really seems to twist scientific data to suite anti-teen feelings in our culture.  What constitutes "bad decision making", anyway?  That's a very subjective opinion.

When I found this post a while back, I simply loved it.  It deals with just that subject, and does so in such a wonderfully positive, pro-people way.  It reads in part:

"Though Teen brains may indeed not possess myelin sheaths that adults brains have, that doesn’t make them 'unfinished', in the sense that the article portrays: foolish, flawed, poor decision makers.

Without Teen’s 'unfinished' brains 99% of the risk taking done in the name of love, art, idealism, adventure, protecting family, would disappear.

Teens excel at taking risks because they have perfectly developed brains for doing so.

Saying they have unfinished brains compares to saying a new moon hasn’t 'finished' until it swells to a full moon. The Teen brain marks one moment in the cycle of the brains life where it has enormous potential for one kind of behavior - risk taking, adventure, romantic expression."

I urge you to read the whole post.  It's not very long.  Personally, I just loved it, and will send it straight to the next person who seeks to silence and dis-empower a teen by telling them of their faulty brains!

Peace,
Idzie