And Dr. Phil Says

Last week Under the No Room To Compromise Section:

Dr. Phil brings up research. “The truth is, the research shows there is absolutely no disruption of social development and evolution in children who are home schooled up through the eighth grade,” he tells them. “But that presupposes that the parents are willing to make the time commitment, the money commitment, the lifestyle commitment to provide that academic environment for the child at home. And then to take them to participate in extra-curricular activities of their peer group. Like the Boys and Girls Club, the YMCA, the church groups and socials, and sports and choirs and things like that. Once kids get to high school, social development is important. They become more independent. They want to interact on their own. They’re post-pubescent. And so they don’t do well in a home school environment in high school as they do socially in a public or private school.”

As for who's right, Dr. Phil sides with Jylana's position. “The truth is, he's not going to be some nerd who’s scared of his own shadow if they’re home schooled, if you do a good job with the home schooling, and you get him into the extra-curricular activities after the fact.”

I was pleasantly surprised with what he said. Wonder why he assumes that the magic 'age' of "high school" is the time where they suddenly need to 'hang out' with the classmates in the classroom. (What kind of socialization is that again where they have to have a pass to pee? Oh, yeah...school ready socialization) That age is a great time to find good mentors, apprentice, try out some community college classes and hang out with other teen homeschoolers and their public/private school pals when they're free.
But it was good to see a psychologist approve of homeschooling to the extent he did. As one Psychiatry Fellow in Ohio stated when wanting to conduct a homeschooling mental health survey:

It is no secret that some in our society (most especially those in the mental health field) are either suspicious of, or, in a number of cases, quite hostile to the idea of homeschooling.