WEBVTT

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Carthago. Delenda asked, Hello and
welcome to Everything's Political. I'm your host

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Taya Shoemaker. You can find us
online at Everything's Political dot substack dot com.

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The email address for the show is
podcast at epconsistency dot net. I'll

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say that again, it's new podcast
at epconsistency dot net. Shout out to

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Magicman Joe Strucker, the Mark Twain
of podcast producers, born on this day

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as Samuel Clemens was his real name
in eighteen thirty five. Of course,

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prolific and brilliant writer. The exact
origins of his pen name are unknown,

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but it's worth noting that mark Twain
is a nautical term for water found to

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be around twelve feet deep, And
of course Clemens operated riverboats when he was

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young, and that was also the
topic of much of his writing. Brilliant

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man and funny. One of my
favorite quotes is that he never lets schooling

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get in the way of his education, and that's going to be the topic

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we'll discuss with our guest today.
He is the CEO of Classical Conversations,

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which is the world's largest classical homeschool
community. He also sits on the board

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of homeschool Now USA, the Carolinas
Rugby Union, and Clemson University's rugby Foundation.

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He is Robert Borton's Robert, thank
you so much for being here today.

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Welcome, thank you for having me
excited to talk about education and everything

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that's going on in the universe around
us. Absolutely, first, let's get

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the important thing out of the way. Given your alma mater, I gotta

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know, are you a diet in
the wool ACC fan or just your university.

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I don't think anyone at Clemson's fan
of the ACC. They've kind of

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done us sturdy a few times over
the years. So I'm looking forward to

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the predicted move to either the Big
Ten or the SEC. So we'll see

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how much longer we hold on to
the Atlantic Coast Conference. That's awesome.

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I appreciate that. Yeah, well, the SEC will welcome you with open

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arms. We are a lovely and
competitive conference. Okay, yes, we

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love it, Robert. The last
several years have exposed a lot of cracks

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in the foundation of the Republic,
and when people look for the impetus or

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proliferation of those cracks, well,
education comes to the top of that list.

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And I'll take a note here under
your leadership at classical conversations it has

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grown three hundred percent. First of
all, congratulations, and second of all,

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I hope it rises exponentially over the
next decade. From your vantage point,

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what does the brokenness I should say, how in what the brokenness speaks

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to parents that I've driven them to
options like homeschooling that maybe a few years

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ago they thought was extreme or beyond
their purview of consideration. Yeahf COVID.

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Obviously a lot of parents knew that
the school system were bad, but they

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maybe thought, well, it's not
in my system, or I know some

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of the teachers and they're good people, which you know, in generally the

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teachers are good people. They're just
in a system that is designed to treat

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children as if they're you know,
spokes and just part of the cog in

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the machine, and that they're just
moving them along a conveyor belt. And

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so as parents realized, you know, through COVID, whether they were sitting

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on zoom classes or just how the
schools started treating parents and children, that

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something was broken and it was in
their system. And so you know,

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through COVID, of course, a
lot of people were at home doing public

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school, which some people consider homeschooling. But really what we consider homeschooling is

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as a parent directed education where the
parents are making the decisions for their children.

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And so pre COVID there was roughly
about two million students homeschooling. During

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CO you know, there's roughly about
five four to five million most people considered

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to be homeschooling, and of course
many more that were at home. And

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many parents through that just saw that
their children weren't being educated or that teachers

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were just at worse, even worse, was pushing ideas on their kids that

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were the antithesis of their own families
morality or plans, and so they decided

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to take it into their own hands. And even as schools have started opening

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up or are now fully open,
you know, many people continue to homeschool

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or send their kids to alternative education
away from the government funded public schools,

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and so, you know, parents
have the ability to educate their children.

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They realized that these experts have been
failing them. And of course we see

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the rise of just mental issues with
the young people that are in our government

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school systems because of the just the
lies in the propaganda that they're currently and

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constantly being fed. Indeed, there
are so many repercussions of what has gone

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on, not just physically or mentally, but also just this this epic condition,

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if that's a proper term of our
young people hating our country. And

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I love that parents are taking ownership
of their child's education. We encourage that.

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Often here there are parents who think, oh, gee, I could

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never do that because I'm not good
at math, or I'm not good at

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history or whatever. We like to
encourage people to say, but now you

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have an opportunity to relearn it.
What would you say to parents who are

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on the fence or just considering homeschooling, Yeah, I would first say you

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can do it. And if you
are, you know of those parents like

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how am I going to teach math? Well, don't send them to the

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same system that really indoctrinated you into
telling you that you couldn't teach your own

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kids. That's just you know,
doing the same thing over and over again

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and expecting different results. There's also
a ton of homeschooling material out there now

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for parents that are designed for you, the homeschooler, just knowing that you're

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not an expert in everything, and
I would just say, as well,

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you know, roughly thirty percent of
our students in our government schools are at

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grade level, so clearly the experts
don't know what they're doing either. And

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really it's a love of learning at
classical conversations that we want to pass on

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and teaching children that they can really
learn anything. And so as a parent,

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when I don't know anything, admitting
that or saying here, let's go

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figure it out together is a great
way one to teach your children a valuable

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skill that will last them a lifetime, to approach education with humility. And

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three, it can be fun when
you and your children are doing things together.

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I know a ton of our families
we learn Latin at classical conversation,

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and by the time our students are
in high school, they've you know,

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surpassed their parents, but their parents
still have a teacher's guide that they can

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use to you know, check work. You know, the children can be

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self directed, so you're more helping
them manage their workload and really flourish into

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adulthood while they're still under your own
home versus having those experiences in college or

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maybe you know, just as a
nineteen year old doing something else. So

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it's really a great opportunity for you
as a parent to you know, just

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bring the family together and just love, love one another and grow together as

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a family and learning. And I'm
glad you brought up Latin. Some of

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our listeners have heard me say this
before. Latin is what brought me to

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classical conversations. So years ago,
longer than I care to admit. My

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uncle went to a classical Latin school
and he tutored me through a math that

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was a higher level than he actually
took, but he was able to figure

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it out realize we're doing math.
And my aunt at the time asked him,

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did you take this in school?
And he said, no, but

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you know, here's what they're doing
and blah blah blah. And she said,

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well, how is it you can
tutor her if you never took it,

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And she looked at He looked at
her like she had three heads,

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and he said, Leah, I
took four years of Latin. Latin makes

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you think now she and I were
trying to connect the dots like Latin math

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whatever, you know. But he
was he was all over it, and

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he you know, his whole life
when he would have discussions and he was

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just one of those guys that could
talk about anything and would inform himself,

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educate himself. Knew a lot about
a lot, and he attributed it all,

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including his fantastic vocabulary, to Latin. So fast forward twenty some years

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and we decided to homeschool, and
I look up Latin curriculum homeschool and up

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op classical conversations. So that's what
I love that story. Yeah, our

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students, of course do if you
start, you know, K four or

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whatever, you'll do thirteen years of
Latin with us. And I always tell

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people, you know, it's a
saying in business that we overestimate what we

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can get done in the short term, and we underestimate what can be done

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in the long term. And it's
the same thing with education. It seems

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like you've got to got to know
all these things and you've got a lot

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to do, but really you just
have to stay, you know, a

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couple of seconds or a day ahead
of your own student. And so,

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you know, had classical conversations.
We often hear from our families that they're

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redeeming their education at the same time, and you know, we even started

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a master's program for the moms primarily
in our program, so that you know,

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if they have a four year degree. They can actually go and while

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they're going through the curriculum with their
own students do similar work and get a

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master's in the classical arts. And
so I say that we have about forty

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five thousand families in our program,
So we have forty five thousand of the

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smartest moms in the world homeschooling with
us on this journey. And it's it's

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a real privilege. One percent.
That is amazing. I'm so glad you

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guys are doing that. I think
there is something about watching and helping your

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child with that light bulb moment is
what some people call it. When it

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clicks, there's just no other feeling. It's like I get that. I

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feel like we've taken that away from
our our traditional teachers right in the traditional

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environments, because now we've turned them
into administrators and they have to check all

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of these other boxes except really pouring
into the children. And that's you know,

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that's one of the crimes of the
century. But for folks who are

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interested in the classical model, there
are different flavors of homeschooling. I love

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the classical model because it to me, it just made so much sense,

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regardless of what age you are.
It applies to how we learn. Can

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you tell us a little bit about
that? Yeah, So I would argue

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that if you've learned anything, you've
done it through the classical model, even

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if it wasn't explicitly stated or you
even know what that means. And the

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classical model is broken down into what
we call the trivium for younger ages,

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and it's three stages. The first
stage is the grammar stage. And of

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course a lot of us think about
English grammar, but grammar's really just the

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basic compounds of anything. So there's
a grammar of math, there's a grammar

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of science. There's a grammar of
baking. There's a grammar of basketball,

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there's anything that you do. You
start as a grammarian when you first approach

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it. You know, you need
to if you're going to bake a cake,

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you know what's a teaspoon, what's
a tablespoon, what's a cup?

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You need to have all of these
ideas in your head before you start mixing

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things together. Otherwise you might just
go get your you know, eight ounce

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coffee mug and start using that as
your cup. You know. So it's

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vitally important that you understand the grammar, and so we practice that with our

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young kids kindergarten through sixth grade,
where they're just memorizing multiplication tables, scientific

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facts, historical facts, and children
love to learn. Their brains are developing

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at that time to learn through memorization. And yeah, they don't have a

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lot of life experiences to pull from, so they don't really know what they're

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memorizing or why they're memorizing it.
But when they get older, when they

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go to what we call the dialectic
stage or logic stage, and that's kind

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of in middle school, they start
pulling these ideas and say, oh,

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this is how these things work together. And then the rhetorical stage, which

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is how we try to develop our
high school students, is when you can

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then you know, go and bake
a cake and enter it into the competition,

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or teach someone else how to bake
a cake and you know, or

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go play in a basketball game and
hit the game winning shot. So each

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of us just go through these different
phases, you know, like Michael Jordan

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would dribble for two hours a day
sometimes and he was the greatest basketball player

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ever, but he knew he had
to have a really strong grammar of dribbling,

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and so he practiced dribbling all the
time, which is why he was

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so great at what he did.
And so anytime, you know, if

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you're gonna go learn to change your
oil in your car for the first time,

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the first thing you're gonna need to
learn is the grammar of you know,

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what's a dipstick, what's the what's
the oil can look like, what's

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the rag? You know, all
these different what's what type of oil do

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I need to put in it?
So there's everything that you learn you use

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through the grammar stage, and which
is why really sports and music are the

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two areas where we've never lost the
classical model and why I think personally that

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you know, students who participate in
music and in sports kind of accidential accidentally

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catch you know, this methodology of
learning, and why they kind of excel

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in government institutions is because they have
had some exposure. So we've all had

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if you've played music or sports,
and most of us had it for a

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little while, had some exposure to
the classical model. And that's why homeschoolers

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like it so much because you don't
need to, you know, be an

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expert in every single subject matter.
You just need to understand, you know,

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what's the age of my child and
what are the core things that we

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need to learn to move forward.
And so I hear you saying it's a

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marathon. Basically, it's a marathon
of mastery. And I'm so glad that

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you brought up sports because my main
bugaboo with the one and done. Now

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I have several bugaboos with it.
I don't like it. I never liked

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it, but one of the main
problems I had with it was that it

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precludes mastery. You cannot master the
game of NCAA basket ball in six months,

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right. You can't master a or
gel as a group. You can't

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run the motion offense, uh,
you know, effectively, or or run

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your screens. I mean you need
that time, you need the practice.

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You need the mastery in order then
to be rhetorical. Right, connect the

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dots and then be rhetorical. So
I'm glad you brought that up because it's

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a It's an analogy that I that
I use often about Really we've done away

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with mastery because I feel like we're
in a we're in a short attention span

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society and it's Uh, I understand
the parents who say, well, I'm

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not an expert at this, uh
and and it'll take me too long to

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learn it. But really you can
learn with your child. And you mentioned

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this before. One of the I
call it the selfish part of homeschooling is

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that you either learn something you didn't
know or you relearn it with your adult

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eyes. And that's kind of a
light bulb moment right for us for adults.

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Oh ye, yeah, yeah,
even being homeschooled myself, I see

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that when I'm homeschooling my three young
kids. Is Chris, my wife does

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the heavy lifting. But even as
I'm you know, participating in that that

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it's like, wow, it's like
I don't remember learning that, or oh

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yeah, this is really cool.
You know, did you know about this

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as well? So it's a great
way I think, to engage and you

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don't need to yeah, the experts. My wife was a public school teacher

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for ten years. She taught middle
school, and really, like being a

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homeschool mom now, she had to
let go of like a lot of what

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they taught her because they didn't actually
teach her how to pass knowledge down to

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the next generation. What they said
and you alluded to this earlier, or

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they taught her is you know how
to manage a classroom and how to make

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sure that people were behaving properly and
things of this nature. And my future

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sister in law, who's engaged to
my younger brother, she taught third graders

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and her good job was to sit
them in from front of a computer.

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This was in a good school district, sit them in front of a computer

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and monitor them as they learned from
a screen. So it's not the world

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out there that you think it is. Yeah. Absolutely, I'm glad you

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brought up experts. Over the last
few years in the healthcare industry, I

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have said often that experts with a
lot of degrees after their name remind me

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that thermometers have a lot of degrees, And now I know why nurses stick

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them where they do for their most
accurate readings. Okay, so I heard

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that one if we let teachers teach, they are the expert, because I

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do believe we have a lot of
great teachers out there who are just handcuffed

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and that's unfortunate. But I do
want to go back to something you mentioned.

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Tell us your experience. I was
not homeschooled. Tell us your experience

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homeschool Yeah, so my mom was
one of the kind of founders and pioneers

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in the early eighties, and she
decided she wanted to give us a different

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education that she received. She used
an aerospace engineer from Michigan. Both of

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my parents are so the world considers
them highly educated, and she did not

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consider herself highly educated. And so, yes, So, I mean it

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started out, you know, there
wasn't resources like there are today, so

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you know, going to the library, going to you know, school book

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sales, just trying to find and
piece together materials and talking to some of

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the other few people you know,
homeschooling in the United States back then,

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maybe there's ten thousand of us.
I'm not exactly sure the number, but

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not very many. And you know, we joined homeschool co ops and you

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know, we you know, kind
of switched curriculums every year, trying to

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figure out what worked and what didn't
work. We formed sports league, so

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we actually started a middle school basketball
team and created a high school basketball team

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for homeschoolers, and you know,
ended up being track and volleyball and boys

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and girls and all sorts of stuff. So just really involved. And then

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as I was going into high school, you know, a lot of our

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friends were like, how am I
going to homeschool on these harder subjects?

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You know, can our kids get
into college even like, because that was

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a question. Back then, there
were colleges that discriminated against homeschoolers, that

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would not admit them even if they
both had a perfect SAT score ACT score,

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because that was just their policy was
no homeschoolers. So it was,

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you know, kind of a scary
time. And at that point, my

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parents you know, talked to a
couple of headmasters to see if you know,

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what they had at their school,
and they had what they were looking

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for for my education, and all
the headed masters basically said, no,

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that's not that classical model. Stuffs
not something that we offer here. And

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so my dad told my mom,
well, you better just see if you

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can get a group of homeschoolers together
at our house and so that you know,

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we can do these things like have
debates, you know, read history

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papers, you know, not just
have a you know, a mom and

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their kid together, but have a
group of us studying the same thing.

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So in nineteen ninety seven, we
had eleven students in our basement and that's

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how classical conversations got started. I
graduated high school a couple of years later,

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a year early, and like I
said, went to Clemson University,

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as you alluded to earlier, and
you know, got an industrial engineering degree

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there and spent about eight years as
an engineer before coming home to work on

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the and with the family business.
That's awesome, Thank you for sharing that.

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For listeners who haven't connected the dots. Lee Borton's is Robert's mom.

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We've had her on the program before. She's amazing, favorite guest, one

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of our favorite guests, and absolutely
a pioneer in the homeschooling movement. We

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all stand on their shoulders, and
I'm so glad you mentioned Robert the group

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of students in your basement. There
are so many misconceptions about homeschooling. You

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know. The first thing out of
everyone's mouth when they learn you're a homeschooler

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is what what about social exactly?
And nowadays I just say, well,

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guess what, that's exactly why we
homeschooled. Yeah, yeah, and I

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think of that question as much now, although we still get it every once

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in a while. Yes, yeah, I do think that's changing a little

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bit. And the other couple of
things. Number One, colleges are now

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going after homeschoolers. So, I
mean there is a huge change, and

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I love that. Have have you
experienced the same recruitment level from the CC

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from the Challenge level. Yeah,
So our challenge program or high school program

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has been growing faster. It has
been the fastest part of our organization that's

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been growing. We'll have we had
about twenty five hundred graduates last year.

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We'll have over three thousand this upcoming
year. And they are getting recruited by

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colleges. You know. We're of
course, a lot of people aren't going

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to college nowadays, so I'm not
saying that it's the only way. I'm

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just saying we've got about a dozen
college partners now that if you go to

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CC in our high school program,
they'll either give you scholarships or almost give

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you automatic admissions. So they're recruiting
hot and heavy. Even the public schools.

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The public colleges are you know,
you know, going to have recruiters

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for homeschoolers because they see us as
a way of diversifying their student body because

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they want to have you know,
a certain amount of public schoolers, some

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from charter, some from private,
and some from homeschoolers. So the colleges

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and even employers now are actively looking
for homeschool students. So it's really has

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changed a lot. And yeah,
the socialization question, you know, we

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part of that reason why was a
lot of people don't understand that homeschooling wasn't

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legal in every single state until nineteen
ninety three, and so the first ten

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years that I was alive, homeschooling
wasn't necessarily legal in the states that we

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lived in. And it wasn't that
we weren't being social because we didn't want

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to be. It was because we
could get arrested or thrown in jail or

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fined. You know, nowadays,
homeschoolers, from the people that I talked

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to, are some of the most
articulate, well socialized, And what we

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say is we want civilized individuals,
not socialized individuals, civilized adults around and

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so, you know, society has
recognized that parents do a wonderful job when

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they are the primary educator of their
students, no matter their socio economical educational

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background. And back to the colleges, you know, it makes sense from

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a pr standpoint that colleges would want
students who can learn right your self learning

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at some point, who know how
to learn, students who will stay right,

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and students who will do well.
That makes the college look good.

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So absolutely, that makes total sense
that they would open up to the demographic.

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There are still a few stinkers out
there, I think who will discriminate,

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but I think even some of the
Ivy League schools are recruiting homeschoolers.

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Now, you know what, send
my kid to any of those Ivy League

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schools exactly. I mean just look
at the news and all the things that

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they're protesting for who they're protesting against. There's you know, all these donors

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from these Ivy League schools are pulling
money out and saying you're not gonna get

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another penny from me. So there's
this worldview that's been unfortunately pushed through all

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the colleges. But the Ivy Leagues
have certainly led the way that is,

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you know, against really human flourishing
and why America was and it still is,

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although it might be just barely holding
on the greatest country around night around

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right now. Yes, agreed,
I kind of liken that to parents who

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would come to me and say I
spend every night trying to undo what was

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done in school all day, and
when homeschoolers come to me and say I

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just want to send them to X, Y Z or wherever, I'm like,

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okay, but consider you might be
undoing what you've done. I mean,

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at some point, our children are
adults and they're going to make their

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own decision, and I think that
just varies with the child. But there

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is there is that precarious point.
Yeah. So, I mean a lot

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of you know, Christians, if
they send their kids to government schools or

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even the private schools, because critical
race theory and all these critical theories are

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alive and well, and most private
education institutions as well, you know,

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you're going to have to deprogram your
kid every single night, or spend time

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guiding them towards or explaining why this
is the truth and why what they're learning

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in school is inaccurate, which then
going to beg the question why should they

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pay attention in school if they realize
the school is giving them inaccurate information?

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Or you know, are they going
to have the courage to stand up and

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say, no, teacher, you're
wrong, this is not right. This

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is you know, based on you
know, principles that violate our constitution and

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our free will most likely not right. They're just going to want to get

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along with their students and their friends. So yeah, parents, if you

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care about your children, you know, maybe you can't get them out of

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the system right now, but you
can start, you know, reading them

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the classics. You can start having
these conversations because you'll wake up to find

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your children believe something totally opposite of
what you believe. And you know,

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the systems are not passing on the
values that have made our country what it

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is today. And you know we're
seeing the consequences of that. You know,

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those cracks around us, those cracks
in society, you know, the

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division, the hate, that's all
because our systems have been designed around hating

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our forefathers and what principles that we're
that we stand on as a country.

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So you know, we are a
Christian country. We do have those Judeo

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values. But uh, sixty percent
of I think gen Z doesn't believe lying

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is wrong, and so hey,
maybe your kid does, but guess what

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their two best friends don't. So
who do you think is gonna win out

356
00:28:59.519 --> 00:29:07.119
that battle. Yes, it's a
complete rejection of the Western tradition and the

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values that built the Western tradition.
I mean, I think that term Western

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tradition is you know, that's a
cuss word to most people in academia at

359
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this point. So I also wanted
to see if you had any further experience.

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I mean, your mom kind of
paved the way with this. But

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one of the other things that I
like to talk to parents about is when

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they say, well, what about
sports, well what about music? Well

363
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what about They're not going to get
all this stuff that you know, our

364
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tax dollars pay for in the public
schools. And I kind of say,

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well, you're going to have to
weigh the risk, right, are you

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00:29:45.640 --> 00:29:48.880
sending them to be indoctrinated just so
they can have a violin class or or

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learn a specific language, or you
know, you can do it yourself.

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But one of the awesome parts about
homeschooling and it from from every walk,

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right, whether someone graduated college or
not, or they were entrepreneurial or whatever

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the case may be, some of
the most brilliant and innovative people moms and

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dads. And I've always said,
if it doesn't exist in the homeschool community,

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someone will think of it and do
it better than anybody's ever done it

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before. And classical conversations is a
perfect example of that. Yeah, thank

374
00:30:23.720 --> 00:30:27.720
you so very much. Yeah,
parents rise to the occasion for their kids

375
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because they love them, and so
really the only sport that's difficult to do

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is football. There are homeschool football
teams though, because that's just the most

377
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expensive sport. But besides that,
I mean basketball players now homeschool like tennis,

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00:30:42.200 --> 00:30:48.440
golf swimmers, like any of these
gymnasts, any of these high performing

379
00:30:48.480 --> 00:30:53.680
athletes in general are homeschooling these days
because they need a time out of school

380
00:30:53.720 --> 00:30:59.799
to work on their craft. And
even some of the baseball players. I

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00:30:59.839 --> 00:31:03.160
think one of the top ten players
drafted this past year was a homeschool kid.

382
00:31:03.759 --> 00:31:07.839
So it is possible. And I
just think that's a great question that

383
00:31:07.880 --> 00:31:11.000
you said, Like what are you
sacrificing? Like are you going into this

384
00:31:11.119 --> 00:31:15.440
wide eyes? Wide open. We
had some friends that were good friends with

385
00:31:15.480 --> 00:31:19.279
my younger brother. They were in
classical conversations and they decided that they wanted

386
00:31:19.640 --> 00:31:25.640
play high school football because his dad
played high school football. And quite candidly,

387
00:31:25.759 --> 00:31:27.759
that's the decision they made. They
you know, he said, I

388
00:31:27.759 --> 00:31:33.400
haven't learned anything in four years of
high school, and yeah, and then

389
00:31:33.880 --> 00:31:37.480
he went on to college. He
went and got to play D three football

390
00:31:37.599 --> 00:31:41.200
for halfway through his first semester,
he quit the team because he decided that

391
00:31:41.559 --> 00:31:48.119
he had had enough of football,
and by that summer he had quit school

392
00:31:48.240 --> 00:31:52.240
and had enrolled in the military.
So, I mean, a good family,

393
00:31:52.240 --> 00:31:57.680
they love the Lord, but they've
wasted five years of life pursuing athletics

394
00:31:57.799 --> 00:32:01.559
that you know, athletic and themselves
is great. You know. I'm a

395
00:32:01.680 --> 00:32:07.839
I've played sports all my life.
I run a rugby team where two time

396
00:32:07.960 --> 00:32:14.039
national champions. My wife was a
collegiate athlete as well. So we love

397
00:32:14.119 --> 00:32:16.359
sports, but you have to put
them in their proper place. And if

398
00:32:16.400 --> 00:32:22.200
you're picking athletics over academics, you
know you're gonna be hard pressed to really

399
00:32:22.279 --> 00:32:27.559
live a flourishing life that God intended
you to live. I think it should

400
00:32:27.559 --> 00:32:32.039
be a symbiotic relationship, right,
I mean, can you get the fullness

401
00:32:32.799 --> 00:32:38.119
of the value of sports without the
academics, in the in the moral teachings

402
00:32:38.119 --> 00:32:42.559
that go with it, right,
I mean, because it's it's all connected,

403
00:32:42.599 --> 00:32:45.720
like the classical right, it's all
connected. Nothing goes to waste.

404
00:32:46.359 --> 00:32:52.559
And I love this. The marathon
approach to education but it's not very popular.

405
00:32:52.680 --> 00:32:58.839
Robert. We want our kids to
be Einstein in the third grade,

406
00:32:58.880 --> 00:33:02.640
and it's just we expect of them
things for which they're not ready. Like

407
00:33:02.680 --> 00:33:06.400
I said earlier, you know,
we you know, think that we can

408
00:33:06.440 --> 00:33:09.200
get a lot done, a lot
faster in the short term, and then

409
00:33:09.240 --> 00:33:13.039
the long term we can get a
lot more than we actually think we can

410
00:33:13.079 --> 00:33:16.400
get done. So you know,
it's a process. And you know,

411
00:33:16.559 --> 00:33:22.920
attention spans of goldfish is like eight
seconds, and I think for adults it's

412
00:33:22.920 --> 00:33:28.519
now like six. So we have
fallen behind the attention span of goldfish.

413
00:33:28.519 --> 00:33:35.599
And it's not a system that's gonna
continue to give us positive results. And

414
00:33:35.640 --> 00:33:39.960
so we have to get off the
hamster wheel. We have to re engage

415
00:33:40.079 --> 00:33:45.519
with our children, with the next
generation, otherwise we're going to continue to

416
00:33:45.559 --> 00:33:52.640
be in you know, significant trouble
as a society going forward. And you

417
00:33:52.640 --> 00:33:55.680
know, for sports, my daughter, she's a gymnast, you know,

418
00:33:55.759 --> 00:34:00.519
one of the top ten in the
state. She's eight years old, practices

419
00:34:00.599 --> 00:34:04.799
three hours a day, three days
a week. So you know, we're

420
00:34:04.799 --> 00:34:10.280
fully into sports, not trying to
downplay the positive benefits of being healthy and

421
00:34:12.480 --> 00:34:16.039
competitive and learning those disciplines. But
what I'm saying is when you put C.

422
00:34:16.199 --> 00:34:19.639
S. Lewis put it this way. When you put first things first,

423
00:34:19.719 --> 00:34:23.159
second things are elevated, and sports
are definitely a second thing. But

424
00:34:23.239 --> 00:34:27.880
if you make them the number one
thing in your family, you're gonna be

425
00:34:27.920 --> 00:34:30.400
in trouble. And you know,
a lot of times we use sports as

426
00:34:30.400 --> 00:34:34.639
a way of, hey, we're
going to help people get out of a

427
00:34:34.679 --> 00:34:37.920
bad situation. Well, it's something
like only one percent of high school students

428
00:34:37.960 --> 00:34:45.000
get a college scholarship in sports,
so it's not a very likely path Versus

429
00:34:45.079 --> 00:34:47.159
if you spend that much time and
effort, you know, learning math or

430
00:34:47.239 --> 00:34:52.760
Latin or Spanish or anything else,
would definitely give you a better outcome in

431
00:34:52.800 --> 00:34:55.840
your life. If you are part
of that one percent that make it to

432
00:34:57.039 --> 00:35:00.719
college athletics, and then you're the
one percent of that one percent that goes

433
00:35:00.760 --> 00:35:05.360
on to professional sports. You know, if you make it to the NBA,

434
00:35:05.519 --> 00:35:08.239
it's something like eighty percent of them
are bankrupt within two years of getting

435
00:35:08.280 --> 00:35:13.800
out. If you make it into
NFL football, besides all of the you

436
00:35:13.840 --> 00:35:19.400
know, head trauma and mental issues
that the players can develop, something like

437
00:35:19.440 --> 00:35:22.199
seventy percent of them are bankrupt three
years out of you know, getting out

438
00:35:22.199 --> 00:35:27.840
of professional so even making it to
the top of the top, you know,

439
00:35:28.039 --> 00:35:31.360
it's not really life changing money for
you know, sixty to seventy percent

440
00:35:31.440 --> 00:35:37.639
of professional athletes. So it's just
not a it's not a path that sound

441
00:35:38.440 --> 00:35:44.599
for society to put people on,
and it's not realistic it and that this

442
00:35:44.679 --> 00:35:47.960
is my other bugaboo with the one
and done, because it's mainly just a

443
00:35:49.000 --> 00:35:54.199
social engineering program. That is not
the point of collegiate sports. Its social

444
00:35:54.239 --> 00:35:58.920
engineering, right, I mean,
there are so many other benefits. And

445
00:35:59.400 --> 00:36:01.880
to your point about the rising tide, right, the first things and the

446
00:36:01.920 --> 00:36:07.360
second length things rise. I think
that is also what used to be the

447
00:36:07.400 --> 00:36:13.559
biggest benefit when schools that when most
schools were using the classical model. And

448
00:36:13.559 --> 00:36:15.960
I forget when it was that we
kind of got away from that one room

449
00:36:16.079 --> 00:36:21.199
school house. Do you remember when
that was Well I wasn't alive then,

450
00:36:21.280 --> 00:36:24.840
but I mean most people would say
I wasn't either. By the way forties

451
00:36:24.880 --> 00:36:29.360
and fifties, yeah, you know, the classical model. Just for our

452
00:36:29.400 --> 00:36:35.719
listeners, I believe that does raise
everyone's level. The uncle that I mentioned

453
00:36:35.760 --> 00:36:40.079
earlier, he graduated from that classical
Latin school, probably with what is the

454
00:36:40.119 --> 00:36:45.519
equivalent of a genuine liberal arts degree
in a college. I mean, that's

455
00:36:45.519 --> 00:36:50.239
how well educated he was. And
we had a whole, well, one

456
00:36:50.239 --> 00:36:58.119
to two generations of people that whether
they were plumbers or electricians or regardless of

457
00:36:58.159 --> 00:37:04.880
what field they chose, they could
speak and speak well about books. They

458
00:37:04.920 --> 00:37:10.440
could speak well or articulate the issue
with their craft which they mastered. Goodness

459
00:37:10.440 --> 00:37:16.119
gracious that the level of competency in
our society right now is such an all

460
00:37:16.199 --> 00:37:21.840
time low that I mean I write
names and numbers down of people who are

461
00:37:21.880 --> 00:37:27.679
competent because they're that rare these days. And I just get so excited and

462
00:37:27.719 --> 00:37:32.519
grateful that there is someone that has
mastered their craft to be able to explain

463
00:37:32.559 --> 00:37:36.599
it, to be rhetorical with me
about it right, and to tell me

464
00:37:36.639 --> 00:37:42.039
how to fix my computer or whatever. So love I love that analogy.

465
00:37:42.760 --> 00:37:47.719
Based on your experience. Have you
talked to parents there there is It's not

466
00:37:47.800 --> 00:37:54.320
a void, it's just a they
can't flip the switch parents from the narrative

467
00:37:55.039 --> 00:38:00.159
that someone else should be educating their
children. And I know it has a

468
00:38:00.159 --> 00:38:04.199
lot to do with the experts and
that you know, third grade math and

469
00:38:04.599 --> 00:38:07.039
you know, all of the things
we discussed. What would you say to

470
00:38:07.079 --> 00:38:15.480
those parents, because they just they're
frozen and they don't think that they should.

471
00:38:15.599 --> 00:38:19.320
It's a should, right, it's
not necessarily a can. I But

472
00:38:19.440 --> 00:38:23.599
should I be doing this? And
I don't know how to answer that without

473
00:38:24.000 --> 00:38:30.400
getting all biblical. Yeah, I
mean, it certainly is formed by your

474
00:38:30.559 --> 00:38:37.280
worldview and your personal ethics. I
think the you know, I would just

475
00:38:37.679 --> 00:38:43.000
say, you know, we get
about ten thousand plus or minus new families

476
00:38:43.079 --> 00:38:46.079
every year, and so you know, there's tons of ten thousands families in

477
00:38:46.159 --> 00:38:52.360
CC right now who are probably having
those same you know, misconceptions or thoughts

478
00:38:52.440 --> 00:38:55.760
or doubts you know, just a
year ago. And so I would just

479
00:38:55.800 --> 00:39:00.199
say, you know, educate yourself
about the class A model of education.

480
00:39:01.000 --> 00:39:06.880
You know, start asking your kids
some questions about their homework or what they're

481
00:39:06.960 --> 00:39:12.239
learning about in school, just to
start engaging intentionally, even if it's thirty

482
00:39:12.320 --> 00:39:15.159
minutes a night, just teach them
something. You know, you don't have

483
00:39:15.239 --> 00:39:20.559
to decide right now midyear to pull
your kids out and go all in,

484
00:39:21.519 --> 00:39:24.039
although I'd encourage you that you can
do that, and you're legally allowed to

485
00:39:24.079 --> 00:39:27.480
do that, and we'll definitely find
a spot for you in one of our

486
00:39:27.480 --> 00:39:30.280
communities. But you know, it
can start by just saying, Okay,

487
00:39:30.760 --> 00:39:34.719
your dad loves math. You know
you're in fifth grade math. You know

488
00:39:34.760 --> 00:39:37.000
he's going to you know, go
over that with you for thirty minutes a

489
00:39:37.079 --> 00:39:43.760
night. Or hey, let's read
these you know, founding documents or read

490
00:39:43.800 --> 00:39:49.360
about the Founding Fathers together from a
book that isn't been written by someone who

491
00:39:49.360 --> 00:39:52.800
believes in critical race theory. So
if there's things you can do right now

492
00:39:52.840 --> 00:39:59.000
to just practice and kind of show
yourself that it really isn't as difficult as

493
00:39:59.079 --> 00:40:01.639
you think it is, that is
one of the things I encourage people to

494
00:40:01.679 --> 00:40:05.320
do. Also, just read a
book with your child. I mean,

495
00:40:05.320 --> 00:40:10.840
the discussions that can follow are endless
and insightful and one of the many things

496
00:40:10.840 --> 00:40:15.480
I loved about homeschooling. And I'll
say it was the hardest thing we've ever

497
00:40:15.559 --> 00:40:20.760
done, but it was the most
rewarding thing we've ever done. And our

498
00:40:20.840 --> 00:40:24.880
family knew one another, I knew
my kids. I know my kids in

499
00:40:24.920 --> 00:40:30.880
and out, they know me in
and out. Everyone's going to love their

500
00:40:30.960 --> 00:40:35.199
kids and sometimes they feel trapped,
but more and more of them are saying,

501
00:40:35.239 --> 00:40:38.920
you know, let's make real lifestyle
changes so that we can be with

502
00:40:38.960 --> 00:40:44.559
our kids, because that's important.
So, you know, I think it's

503
00:40:44.760 --> 00:40:49.079
if Christians would all homeschool or send
their kids to a true Christian private school,

504
00:40:49.159 --> 00:40:52.719
not one in name only, we
could make a lot of headway in

505
00:40:52.760 --> 00:40:57.599
a really short time in our country. And you know, I would really

506
00:40:57.719 --> 00:41:01.800
encourage you know, businesses to our
education funds for their employees. If you're

507
00:41:01.800 --> 00:41:06.760
a church, you should have a
Christian education fund. You should be supporting

508
00:41:07.280 --> 00:41:13.519
local Christian education, whether it's homeschooling
co ops to three day a week university

509
00:41:13.519 --> 00:41:16.679
schools, or the local private schools. There's so much that we can be

510
00:41:16.760 --> 00:41:23.760
doing now as a society to get
kids into better situations that we don't need

511
00:41:24.199 --> 00:41:30.559
the government coming in and messing it
up. We need parents and local authorities

512
00:41:30.599 --> 00:41:37.559
to be in charge and not not
state bureaucrats. Great ideas, those are

513
00:41:37.639 --> 00:41:42.000
excellent ideas. And I just one
other thing. I think a lot of

514
00:41:42.039 --> 00:41:47.760
people don't understand just how diverse the
homeschool community is. I mean, thank

515
00:41:47.760 --> 00:41:52.719
goodness, it is there. You
know, we had friends who were on

516
00:41:52.800 --> 00:41:59.760
the left side of the spectrum,
and we had wonderful spirited debates, and

517
00:42:00.039 --> 00:42:02.519
our kids were there and at the
end of the day, we know,

518
00:42:02.559 --> 00:42:07.719
consider each other's position. Maybe we
agreed to disagree. That was fine,

519
00:42:07.800 --> 00:42:12.199
that's okay. And I think if
you know, more people were able to

520
00:42:12.239 --> 00:42:15.840
model that or their kids were exposed
to it, then we wouldn't live in

521
00:42:15.880 --> 00:42:21.360
this binary if then fallacy of if
you think this or someone says this about

522
00:42:21.400 --> 00:42:24.760
you, then you're the enemy or
whatever. Yeah, I love those ideas,

523
00:42:24.880 --> 00:42:30.119
Robert. With business, our churches, certainly they need to pick up

524
00:42:30.320 --> 00:42:35.079
pick up the pace a little bit
around. Okay, Robert, I can't

525
00:42:35.079 --> 00:42:37.039
thank you enough. I've enjoyed this. I could talk to you all day.

526
00:42:37.559 --> 00:42:43.199
Where can people find more information about
you? And classical conversations? Yeah,

527
00:42:43.280 --> 00:42:46.280
so my socials are The Robert B
Show and you can find me on

528
00:42:46.840 --> 00:42:52.280
x formally known as Twitter and Instagram. Of course, you can go to

529
00:42:52.320 --> 00:42:57.559
Classical Conversations and we've got all the
socials as well Classical Conversations dot Com.

530
00:42:57.559 --> 00:43:00.920
If you put in your zip code, there'll be local communities near you and

531
00:43:01.280 --> 00:43:05.679
we'll be happy to have a local
support rep reach out to you as a

532
00:43:05.719 --> 00:43:08.360
homeschooling mom, some dads, but
mostly moms that will come and tell you

533
00:43:08.400 --> 00:43:13.119
about homeschooling in your area, and
they're happy to do that for you.

534
00:43:13.199 --> 00:43:16.559
We've got eight hundred of them around
the United States, and if you're listening

535
00:43:16.599 --> 00:43:22.280
to this internationally, we're in I
think fifty seven countries now, so we

536
00:43:22.400 --> 00:43:24.880
might even have one in your country, or we'd be happy to help you

537
00:43:24.920 --> 00:43:30.280
get when started wherever you live.
So Classical Conversations dot Com is the best

538
00:43:30.320 --> 00:43:35.320
website to go to. Fantastic Okay, Robert, thank you so much for

539
00:43:35.360 --> 00:43:39.239
your time today. You are welcome
anytime to come back give us an update

540
00:43:39.280 --> 00:43:43.360
of what's going on, and we
look forward to it. Hope you have

541
00:43:43.400 --> 00:43:46.199
a blessed week. Thank you you
too. Okay again, that was the

542
00:43:46.360 --> 00:43:53.960
Robert b Show on the various social
media platforms and Classical Conversations dot Com.

543
00:43:54.159 --> 00:43:59.840
Highly recommend you go check that out
if you are anyone you know is considering

544
00:44:00.320 --> 00:44:04.679
the homeschool lifestyle. Want to thank
you all for listening. Thank you as

545
00:44:04.719 --> 00:44:08.679
always to magic Man Joe Strecker.
Until next time, who will stand at

546
00:44:08.719 --> 00:44:13.679
either hand and keep the bridge with
me. Have a great day. Zilla