As homeschoolers, we work, think, plan, organize and reorganize our homes, curricula, and even our daily schedules to pour into our children the tools we think they will need. It’s a daunting calling, one that takes much time and focus, but one that is rich with rewards. Typically, homeschoolers would not trade what they do for any other job. They are passionate and caring, focused and intentional. That is in all areas except one, as a rule. Homeschoolers tend to drop the ball a bit in career planning, at least in one regard.
Most homeschoolers fall into one of two categories when it comes to college. Either they believe that their child will earn a full scholarship due to some particular skill they have in sports or the fine arts, for instance, or they believe that they’ll figure that out when they get a little closer based on which colleges are “homeschool friendly” at that time. These are both generalities, obviously, and there are shades of belief within them, but what is missing from both ends is the idea of careers.
In reality, college students change their majors frequently. It is not unusual on college campuses for advisors to report that students are on their third or fourth major. What that means to homeschoolers, and to college preparation in general, is that one of the critical strategies of preparing your student for college is to understand that they will need to be well-rounded. To “put all of your eggs into one basket” so to speak, whether the skill-based scholarship camp or the homeschool-friendly college camp could leave your student lacking important options.
Remember that one of the reasons that you decided to homeschool was probably some level of control that you wanted to retain. You wanted to control the influences so that your homeschooled child could take the greatest advantage of the personal attention and increase their effectiveness as adults. One of the ways to do that is to give more options to your homeschool children.
This means that your homeschool program should be rich in content, not just the arts or sports. Your curricula should be full of in-depth critical thinking and writing components so that your child can communicate well in college. Careers are based, initially, on what a child majors in in college and to best plan for that, we need to ensure that our children have more options when we get them into college.
As homeschoolers, be careful of making any assumptions about the likelihood that your child will earn that football or theater scholarship. They may, but they may not. And also don’t think that you can figure it out when you get there if you haven’t given them the solid academic foundation that they need to succeed in college. Make the best use of your child’s homeschool program, by keeping in mind the fact that many students honestly don’t know what they intend to major in when they are in high school. They may not even know the first couple of years in college. For their future careers, no matter the field, they will best be served by planning for depth and broad skill sets – those are the best tools for career planning.
By: Camille Rodriquez
About the Author:
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