Parents/guardians should be in control of their child(ren)'s education, not the state.

Before I begin, I clarify that I use the terms "parents/guardians", "guardians", and "parents" interchangeably; all mean "parents/guardians". As the con, I shall be arguing that legal guardians should not be "in charge of deciding where their children go to school, including the options of alternative education and home schooling," as per the clarified resolution given by the pro in this round, as he has the burden of proof. First, I will rebut Pro's points. Second, I will show that home schooling is not in the best interests of the education of the child, due to external factors such as abuse and dogmatic guardians. Third, I will show that parental choice of education is generally harmful to children. Finally, I will show that state-controlled education works better in practice. I had a bit of difficulty constructing this argument, as there are two different resolutions Pro has brought up. First, he offers clarification for the original resolution, as he explicitly states, "I have been misunderstood before with this resolution. "Control their child(ren)'s education" does NOT mean all parents/guardians would be mandated to design or even implement a curriculum. In this context, "control" means 'in charge of deciding where their children go to school, including the options of alternative education and home schooling'." That serves to clarify the original resolution, "Parents/guardians should be in control of their child(ren)'s education, not the state," before Pro changes the resolution entirely to "countries that restrict a parent's control of their child's education should cease." Because the first resolution to be stated and clarified was the former, I will argue against that. Pro's first point, that the status quo includes persecution, has no relevance to the resolution. The "persecution" of those that home school does not make home schooling correct any more than the persecution of Christians makes Christianity correct. It is a logical fallacy. On a related note, Germany outperformed the United States on the PISA test (7); lending support to the idea that their educational system is superior. Pro's web poll is not cited specifically enough to find it, so I will respond with statistics I found that show that more than half actually home school for religious reasons (6). I will challenge the U.S. News source on the basis that taking testimony from one parent of home schooled children in order to justify the system is not broad enough in scope to have any meaningful implication. The statement about college is skewed; more information about that can be found later in my argument. Pro's third point also has little relevance to the resolution. Most it is entirely subjective. Anything can be considered "a single entity", including a parent/guardian unit. The state, which in cases of educated nations is often democratic, is actually fairer in education because more people have a say in its implementation. State-run education doesn't always equal a dictatorship. External factors make the idealistic view of parent choice an unrealistic view. The idealistic view is that home schooling will "[Nurture] a child's natural thirst for learning, not [squelch it]," and will provide several other benefits (1). In practice, however, it leaves a large number of children with severe disadvantages. Though admitted home schooled children do better at college than public school students, that leaves out a major part of the picture. Home schooled students face a huge problem actually getting admitted into college, and some colleges look unfavorably upon home schooled students. (2) A source indirectly cited by article, as it was a source in the U.S. news he cited states that while approximately 3% of school-age students are home schooled, only 1% of college students come from a background of being home schooled (3). The full research report that in turn came from can be found in my sources as well (4). That is a very poor chance for a home schooled child to make it to college. In these ways, home schooling is an inferior alternative to public school, and thus should not be allowed. Parental choice is harmful to children in general. In addition to hurting chances for college enrollment, as seen above, many other factors arise from home schooling that are extremely detrimental to the well-being of a child. Hundreds of cases of documented abuse were facilitated by home schooling (5), and those are just the documented cases. Home schooling also creates potential for highly dogmatic education. According to the Coalition for Responsible Home Education, approximately 22% of home schooling parents cite "A desire to provide religious instruction" or "A desire to provide moral instruction" as the most important reason for home schooling (6). This blatantly shows that guardian-driven indoctrination is a major component of home schooling; as well, more than 65% of parents/guardians cited "A desire to provide religious instruction" as at least an "Important" reason in the same study. For this reason, guardians should not be allowed to choose alternative forms of education for their own children. Meanwhile, private schooling and school choice also have a strong effect of cream-skimming, or discriminating against lower-opportunity students (8). Finally, state-run education has more potential than education in which parents have a say. The PISA test, a widely-cited basis for comparing national education systems, has results that attest to this. In 2012, the United States ranked in the bottom half of participating countries (7). The majority of students are not taught at home or alternatively schooled in those countries, so success on the PISA depends mostly on public school students. The same statement applies to the U.S. Therefore, it can be logically concluded that the public school system holds a greater impact on the rankings. Let's make a generous supposition that home schooled students do 12% better at the PISA than publicly schooled ones. That's generous, because according to (3 and 4), home schooled students had an average first-year GPA of 3.41, compared to public school students with an average of 3.12, a difference of approximately 10%. The United States had a mean score of 481 on the PISA. 481 * 1.12 = 538.72. That still ranks below Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, Chinese Taipei and Korea. That doesn't sound bad at first, but bear in mind that that assumes that all students would perform just as well as the top third of home schooled kids, as 1% of college students are home schooled, yet home schooled students make up 3% of the student population. This brings to light that even if the United States' education system is worse than home schooling, it has greater potential than home schooling. Therefore, resources should be spent developing state-run education, not defending the educational "rights" of guardians. In conclusion, guardian choice of education does not significantly aid student achievement. It also provides a whole host of new issues, no matter what form the choice occurs in. This is not to say that alternative education is necessarily bad; for example, a state-sponsored school specifically for disabled children could be beneficial. The resolution, however, deals with guardian choice, and guardians should have no say in these matters. Sources: 1.http://www.washhomeschool.org... 2.http://www.pbs.org... 3.http://i.bnet.com... 4.http://files.eric.ed.gov... 5.http://hsinvisiblechildren.org... 6.http://www.responsiblehomeschooling.org... 7.http://www.oecd.org... 8.http://www.maxwell.syr.edu...