After graduating from Patrick Henry College, the Coopers’ firstborn, David, is married, and his wife had their first child this month. David works as a senior consultant for Booz Allen Hamilton in Washington, D.C.

The Coopers’ second son, Jonathan, graduated summa cum laud with a degree in biology from Dallas Baptist University. He is currently finishing his third year in graduate school at University of Texas Southwestern in Dallas. He is working towards a PhD in cancer research.

Their daughter Hannah is currently finishing up her sophomore year at Dallas Baptist University where she is seeking an English degree. She plays harp and piano and owns her own harp business, “Simply Harp” (www.simplyharptx.com).

Congratulations to all these fine home school graduates!

The post Home School Graduates appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Four Angels were named to the All-American Team: seniors Josh Bilello, Kenan Davis, and Dillon Smith and junior Andrew Brechner.

Pictured:
Kneeling L-R: Josh Bilello, Nolan Withrow, Nathan Hall, Jaime Lovell, Caleb Holleman, Jake Preston, Kenan Davis
Standing L-R: Head Coach David Lovell, Jamie Andriot, Dillon Smith, Nathan Shorman, Caleb Pollard, Matthew Fusselman, Jordan Weeks, Andrew Brechner, Asst. Coach Ken Goode

The post Congratulations to Home School World Series Winners! appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Laurel recently traveled to Houston to the DAR State Convention to receive her award. Approximately 191 Junior American Citizen chapters participated, with some chapters submitting more than 100 entries. The annual contest is open to students in grades 9-12. Laurel’s essay will go on to nationals for a possible scholarship opportunity and a trip to Washington D.C.

Thank you, Laurel, for representing our home school chapter of Junior American Citizens with an awesome essay!

The post THSC Congratulates Laurel Robinson appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

More than 100 students competed in preliminary rounds on the Washington College of Law campus in Washington, D.C. The next day the top 32 advocates, including all seven members of the Texas home school group, advanced to argue in the D.C. Federal District Courthouse. The students responded to intense questioning from a panel of judges during their oral arguments.

This year the Best Respondent title goes to Adam Gonzales and Best Petitioner is Isaac Sommers. This is Isaac’s second win in as many years. Other finalists include:

Joshua Upham – Finalist
Hannah Vecseri – Semi-Finalist
Thatcher Townsen – Quarter-Finalist
Greg Guggenmos – Octa-Finalist
Angelle Halvorson – Octa-Finalist

All of the students also compete in NCFCA Speech & Debate, which has helped refine their reasoning and public speaking skills. They were coached by Robert Sommers and Melanie Corley. Congratulations to these students!

The post Texas Home Schoolers Excel in Moot Court – Again! appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

However, as the learning took place and we fell in love with having our son home all the time, I knew that I would not stay in the category of “one year at a time” but rather, “This is our lifestyle.” That decision right there has made a monumental difference in how we conduct school business in our home.

Most of those families that took their decision on a year-to-year basis are no longer teaching their kids at home. Eventually their open-ended decision marched them right back to public school.

Much to their astonishment, we stayed the course and have the graduate to prove it! I would not trade these last fifteen years for any amount of income or freedom. It has been worth every second!
Speaking of the graduate, let me share my story of this young man, who started out his first official day of school by finding a baby squirrel in the front flower bed. I should have known on that day that this home schooling journey would not be “normal.” Such was the theme for every year since then, and I have grown to expect the unexpected!

Ted was a great student. He was eager to learn, smart, and compliant—all good ingredients for a successful school day. He loved to read, so many of our memories are of the two of us sharing a book on the couch while his little brother napped. I think you could say those were our most treasured moments of schooling.

As he got older, Ted would do any kind of work I put before him. We did a combination of workbooks, unit studies, and computer curriculum, with plenty of hands-on learning and notebooking thrown in for creativity. We had a lot of fun.

Middle school came along, and I started feeling the pressure to cut back on creativity and focus more on preparing for high school. Up to that point I was not a drill sergeant, as far as academics were concerned. We had taken a casual approach to learning and enjoyed many different styles. We also had lived by the philosophy that learning took place everywhere and all the time, and that philosophy gave us the freedom we desired in having our kids at home with us. However, when the end of seventh grade came along, I began to get serious about having a plan that extended to graduation.

The summer between Ted’s seventh and eighth grade years, I began reading Barb Sheldon’s book Senior High: A Home-Designed Form+U+La.This book was a priceless tool as I planned the remaining years of Ted’s education.

I began counting high school credits in eighth grade, and because I had read Barb’s book, I counted everything Ted did as hours or content. Any learning activity that took place, be it reading, music, Tae-Kwon-Do, or banking, was recorded in a notebook and tallied at the end of each year as hours toward credits. I am not going to lie: This was a tedious record keeping system, but it was so worth it in the end!

By the time Ted was officially a “freshman,” he had several high school credits under his belt. However, that compliancy that I mentioned earlier was beginning to fade when it came to academics. My creative son was quickly becoming weary of academics and all he could think about was music!

He would begrudgingly make his way through math, English, and history each day and spend the rest of his day recording, composing, and playing his guitar. At first I did not think much of it—what boy does not want to play guitar? However, after about a year of non-stop music, I realized we were dealing with more than a phase—and more of a gift!

Ted would spend every afternoon composing and recording music on his keyboard/recording system. This became such a time-consuming part of his day that I started giving him credit for the hours that he worked on his music. By the time he graduated, he had more than six credits in fine arts and additional credits in recording science.

Ted had always loved music. He sang his first song in church at the age of four, joined the preteen praise band at twelve, and played in the youth band at thirteen. At age fourteen he joined the official Sunday morning praise band, with which he played for three years. When he was not playing at our church, he was playing at a local Christian private school or at a youth group across town on Wednesday nights. The boy never stopped playing his guitar!

He eventually started asking for recording equipment, so he could record more professional-sounding pieces, and began to develop a vision for having his own recording studio one day. Thus, his future was starting to unfold, right before our eyes!

At this point in our schooling I was faced with the choice of pushing for academic excellence or allowing him the time to work within the area of gifting that was so evident. As a home schooling mom, accustomed to having our “school” under a microscope, it was not an easy decision; there are always those who want to question what your kids are learning and doing in the privacy of your own home. However, how could I deny this young man the freedom to pursue music, when he obviously had a gift for it? I am so glad I listened to my heart instead of to the critical voices inside my head. I truly feel it has made him the musician he is today.

As we neared graduation, we knew it was time to discuss college. I dreaded this topic because, when discussed previously, it had become a sore subject in our home. Ted had no desire for four more years of school. His father, on the other hand, put much effort into getting his own college degree and felt that it was a necessary tool in order to make it in the business world. Those were not pleasant discussions!

Finally, the young man who only wanted to eat, breathe, and play music reluctantly agreed to try CollegePlus. Thus began the journey through college basics and CLEP tests. Yet, even though Ted was studying and passing those tests, his mind was on being the entrepreneur and musician that he was made to be.

In the midst of college courses, Ted was figuring out a way to open his own business—a music recording studio—as he had dreamed of doing for years. He had been recording a few clients out of his bedroom or on location, but he wanted to have a professional venue, where the clients could come to him.

He scouted locations, made the contact with the landlord, negotiated the rent amount, signed himself up as a DBA (Doing Business As), and opened the doors to his own business. I was so proud of him! At the young age of eighteen, he was a proud business owner!

This studio was a great lesson in the world of business and finances. He eventually decided to bring the studio back home due to finances, and he still runs his business effectively by using a church studio that was graciously given to him.

Although I attribute all of Ted’s talents and gifts to the Lord, I firmly believe that home schooling him has made a huge difference in his life. Home schooling allowed him to dream, create, and explore on his own terms. It gave him the privilege of time—time to create, time to dream, time to explore his desires for his life. Because he had the freedom, Ted was able to devote time to things that mattered to him, instead of spending time on useless busy work.

Home schooling also gave Ted the chance to be out in the world, making relationships with people of all ages. It gave him the confidence to connect with people on many levels and in many areas of life. It provided the backdrop for Ted to become the person God created him to be, not a follower of the crowd. He is certainly not following the crowd but instead is carving his way through the maze of life, on his way to fulfilling his dreams.

I will be forever grateful for this privilege we call home schooling. I cannot imagine not spending those years with Ted and encouraging him to use his time to perfect his talent. It was time well spent.

To check out Ted, go to his website at TedSlaughter.com.

The post A Home School Graduate: What Freedom and Time Can Do appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Each writer was challenged to write a fiction or non-fiction family adventure story. Contestants from all over the country participated, and winners were announced via the organization’s website.

Learn more about upcoming Young Voices writing contests by visiting the Young Voices website.

We would love to hear from you. Send us your home school success stories!

The post Congratulations to Miss Ryleigh Thomas appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Ryan is a Conroe resident and one of the top players in the Greater Houston area. Last year, he led the SATCH Basketball men’s varsity team, which made it to the state championship game in 2012.

Congratulations, Ryan, from your friends at THSC!

The post Home Schooler Signs Letter of Intent appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

SATCH Volleyball has seven competitive teams for 5th-12th graders plus an elementary-age developmental program. The players gather for weekly devotionals as well as team prayers before and after each match.

SATCH is celebrating its 10th year of competitive sports. Besides volleyball, SATCH offers competitive basketball and golf teams for homeschoolers north of Houston, TX. Congratulations, Lady Mavericks!

The post Home Schoolers Win Volleyball Championship appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Genesis of Robotics, along with other area high school teams, undertook a six-week challenge to build a robot modeled after the conceptual NASA space elevator. The robot needed to climb a 10-foot pole while performing tasks that simulate the delivery of space cargo, such as fuel cells and solar panels. In addition, teams could choose to compete for the top all round BEST award by including aspects of marketing, design, presentation, and spirit.

Genesis of Robotics won the following awards at the Denton County BEST competition:
1st Place Plaque – Notebook
1st Place Plaque – Presentation
1st Place Plaque – Marketing/Booth
1st Place Plaque – BEST new team (to the competition)
3rd Place Plaque – Robot
1st Place Trophy – BEST Award (Top All Round Award)

Upon winning the award, the team huddled in the center of the UNT coliseum to pray, giving God the glory!

The post Home School Team Wins 1st at BEST Robotics appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Our home schooling journey began with the closure of Benjamin’s private preschool. Suddenly we had no place to send him for the fall of his first grade year. We investigated other private schools in our area, church schools, and the local public school. There was also some fringe, hippie, commune, granola “thing” called home schooling that we knew two families were doing. Completely skeptical, Chris at one point even told Bev that it would take the audible voice of God for him to agree to home school the kids. While we had an opinion about home schooling, it was based purely on a lack of information. So in an attempt to be as objective as possible and examine all of our options, we knew that we at least had to do some research on home schooling.

Bev set about reading everything she could get her hands on. We attended a Gregg Harris home schooling conference (That is when God spoke.), compiled a “pros and cons” list, and decided that we should at least give it a try for Benjamin’s first grade year. How hard could it be, right?

Initially opposition from both sides of our families was fierce. Bev comes from a long line of public school teachers, and there is even a school in San Antonio named after her grandfather. Chris’s dad is a bit of an academic. Neither set of grandparents knew anything about home schooling (note from Chris: “and still do not”), and were determined to have their grandbabies properly “socialized,” and not in some “religious cult.” The good news is that after all these years, they have realized that their grandkids have turned out just fine. They do not even grimace anymore when asked where their grandkids go to school.

Chris was graduated from one of the federal military academies and was always drawn to the ability to give our kids an academically excellent education—given the one-on-one tutorial method of home schooling. Bev was drawn to having control over what the kids were taught spiritually, morally, and otherwise. More than anything else though, we both wanted to be the primary influence in our children’s lives and knew that home schooling offered that opportunity.

Over the years, home schooling has enabled us to custom-tailor our kids’ educations to their specific needs, pace, and learning styles; they are not forced to conform to the needs of a random, “average” student in a classroom. We have had late readers who blossomed into voracious and proficient readers because we were able to relax and let them learn at their own pace. There have been years when we did not accomplish all the academics that we wanted and seasons when we seemed to have nothing but interruptions to our school schedule. The one thing for sure that this journey has taught us is that high test scores are not the measure of success. Success is seeing your nineteen-year-old wrestling with his four-year-old brother. Success is having your sixteen-year-old sitting contentedly in church with his two-year-old brother (happily attaching stickers to his big brother’s shirt and face) in his lap. Success is seeing your kids develop their own genuine faith in the God of the universe.

We have both been involved in different home school leadership roles over the years. Chris currently serves on the board of THSC, and Bev hosts a “Smoothing the Way” group for new home schooling moms. We also host “open to the public” informational meetings at the local public libraries where we get to meet prospective home school parents and answer their questions, guide them toward helpful resources, and assure them they can successfully teach their kids at home. At these meetings we see parents who are choosing to home school their children for a wide variety of reasons. Chris is fond of saying that there are as many reasons to home school as there are parents who do it. They may not share our particular convictions or beliefs about education, but we do share a commitment to give our kids the very best. Every parent who leaves feeling encouraged to tackle their children’s education represents a family whose lives might well be changed for eternity.

Chris is self-employed in the land development business. Bev is self-employed as a domestic goddess*. We both enjoy reading, exercise, and chocolate. All of us enjoy sailing, and the oldest three boys have been sailing competitively for three years. Our eldest son, Ben, has just received a congressional nomination for appointment to a federal academy. Luke is learning to fly. Andrew is a Civil War historian. Hannah has been riding in a therapeutic equestrian program where she gets to wear her boots and be a real Texas cowgirl. She, Seth, and Gavin are also taking swim lessons and are becoming very proficient little swimmers. Young Jack sits quietly, observes all, and strategizes his pending global domination. When not teaching school, Bev enjoys doing her nails and eating bonbons in the over-abundance of her free time.

*Editor’s note: A definition of “goddess” is a woman whose great charm or beauty arouses adoration.

Chris and Beverly Parrish live in Houston with their family. Chris and Beverly both served as officers of Christian Home Educators of Central Texas (CHEACT), the regional support group in Austin before they moved to Houston, and Chris continues to serve as a THSC board member on the finance committee.

The post Meet a Texas Home School Family – The Parrish Family appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.