"There is as much dignity in plowing a field
as in writing a poem."
-Booker T. Washington

One of the [many] problems with schools is a tendency to discredit "blue collar" skills. Vocational Technology classes seem to be where the lower-performing kids are placed, and both parents and the system tend to discourage high-performers from going into those fields. As homeschoolers, I think many of us are guilty of the same idea -- the fear that if they choose such a path, others may feel they might have been "more" had they gone to school.

While homeschooled kids are sweeping the spelling bees, it's important to remember that there is nothing wrong with blue collar work. Some may think of factory work or other areas as mindless physical labor, but many people thrive on such a lifestyle. Physical activity and stable work is right up some kids' alleys. And while pure manufacturing jobs may be in danger of low pay or even outsourcing, there are still plenty of areas that are high paying and can't be outsourced -- someone in India can't repair your leaky pipes. Landscapers and construction workers always have work to do, and often, employers can't find enough help.

I personally wouldn't make it in a manual labor position. It's not what I'm cut out for. I'm not good at following orders, or doing repetitive work. I prefer finding ways to make things run easier. I'm more likely to investigate how to design a machine to do the work for me, or research whether doing it in the first place is worth the effort. But if after choosing to unschool my kids, they decide to choose to be doctors, drywallers or drag queens, it's their life choice. Not everyone wants to spend their lives behind a desk, and if we go to all the trouble giving them the freedom and control of their own learning, in a supportive environment, surrounded by resources, and they choose to swing a hammer, we should be proud of them. For more information, check out www.bluecollarandproudofit.com.

From John Taylor Gatto's "Bootie Zimmer's Choice":

"...Thomas Paine's "Common Sense" sold 600,000 copies in the year 1776 to a nation of two and a half million people, about 70% of whom were African slaves or indentured servants. It just boggles the mind to see today's graduate students in political science seminars wrestling with Paine (no pun intended) when young farmers whizzed through it with exhilaration over 200 years ago."

"...a French aristocrat named de Tocqueville wrote a book that's still in print, "Democracy in America," in which he characterized us as the best educated people in history. And in 1838, still 14 years before the militia began marching recalcitrant children to school, another French aristocrat, Michael Chevalier, wrote a book that ranked the American farmer with the immortals of history, a book which said in effect that the farmer went into the field with his plow in one hand and Descartes in the other."