Editor’s Note: Carolina Journal agreed to provide anonymity to the home-schooled families featured in this story. Their names have been changed to ensure their privacy.

RALEIGH — In 2000, as Aaron Johnson began his fourth frustrating year in the public school system, a school employee gave his mom a piece of advice she believes rescued her son from a disastrous future: consider home-schooling Aaron.

Kathy Johnson had heard of home schooling but knew little of what was involved or required. She spent hours scouring the Internet in a desperate search for a way to avoid the consequences of the alarming conclusion she had reached: Her young son’s future was being jeopardized by an inflexible, one-size-fits-all public-school system.

Negative attitude at school started early

The frustrating family journey began in Aaron’s first-grade classroom when a teacher harshly told the boy his writing was sloppy. Kathy was concerned he was being subjected to negativity that would become a self-fulfilling prophecy. “I didn’t want a teacher telling him he couldn’t do it,” she said.

The situation degenerated over time. Aaron told his mom the teachers didn’t help him much. Worried, she began visiting his class and writing letters to the teacher and principal. The school tried to address Aaron’s reading deficiency by putting him in special classes. His skills improved marginally, but he fell further behind. Kathy tried to move her son to a magnet school in the Triad, where he had done well in a summer camp program. She was willing to make the 16-mile round trip each day, but the school’s waiting list was long. She was told the best she could hope for was the possibility of a seat for Aaron the following year.

As mom and son sat together to share a book, it was clear to Kathy that Aaron could barely read. She was appalled when she realized he was also unable to perform basic subtraction. Even worse, Aaron told her he was being bullied. Unsure of what the future held, but convinced she must take bold action, Kathy accepted responsibility for her son’s education and became a home-school mom. That meant learning to be a teacher, shouldering the costs for curriculum and materials, and juggling the school day with her job doing medical transcription from home.

“The first year was hard,” she said, shaking her head. “He was frustrated. Math was hard; he would cry.” Kathy, a single mom, coped alone with the challenges posed by her new role.

Aaron made substantial progress

Ultimately, it was Aaron’s academic progress that kept Kathy’s spirits and commitment high. She could tell he was learning, but she had no proof. There was no baseline testing data from his public school days with which to compare his new end-of-year test results — a yearly, nationally normed assessment that’s required by state law. By year three, Kathy had plenty of confirmation in hand. Aaron’s progress in reading was remarkable. His scores on an Iowa Achievement Test demonstrated three years of gains in just one school year.

Kathy is equally thankful for home-schooling’s impact on her relationship with her son. The two have bonded in a way she believes wouldn’t have been possible otherwise. Yet despite his progress, and to her dismay, Kathy says neighborhood parents advise her to re-enroll Aaron in public school. She’s not about to turn back.

“This mom is my hero,” said Lindalyn Kakadelis, director of the North Carolina Education Alliance. “She took control when the traditional education setting, which works for some kids, was failing him.” The women became acquainted last year when Kathy contacted Kakadelis for advice on finding financial assistance to buy Aaron’s eighth-grade curriculum. The young man who once could barely read will soon study Latin, which is part of the curriculum Kathy has selected.

The average home-school family spends $500 to $600 per child per year on new materials, said Hal Young, president of the service and support group, North Carolinians for Home Education. Nearly 30,000 North Carolina families have chosen the home-school option for about 60,000 children. Nationally, the number of children who are home-schooled reportedly tops one million.

Some home-school parents question why they can’t tap into the taxes they contribute for public education and use the money to pay for home-schooling expenses. Young thinks that action would undermine a fundamental element of the movement: independence from government regulations and oversight.

“The problem you can get into with taking tax money is that the government has the right and responsibility to oversee it,” he said. “Thirty thousand have chosen to step out without state funding, and we think it’s worth it.”

Young said that many families are drawn to the movement for fundamental reasons: the desire to include religious principles in education and concerns over public school curricula and the social environment.

Family seeks flexibility, religious teaching

While Kathy and Aaron came to home-schooling as the last stop on a difficult road, a central North Carolina family made the choice for very different reasons: scheduling flexibility and religion. Kevin and Debbie Morris have six children — five of them school-age. Kevin’s broadcasting job requires him to work evenings and weekends. A traditional school schedule would leave little time with his children, and that prospect was unacceptable to the close-knit, religious family.

“Family time can be minimal,” Kevin said of the typical family’s rushed lifestyle built around getting to and from school and work. “We wanted to raise our kids. We wanted to teach them what we believe.”

With stair-step youngsters ranging from 2 to 15 years, there are numerous teaching duties for the couple to share. Debbie focuses on the younger children, while the older siblings study more independently. Dad is the go-to man for math and science. Home-schooling also allows the parents to broaden their children’s interests and experiences, when and how they choose. Sometimes that’s through their church. Other times, it’s by joining community groups. Five children are competitive swimmers, two are orchestra members, and a teen-age son is a burgeoning chef. The family has visited 42 states on frequent road trips — part vacation, part education opportunity. “That’s denied in a regular school system because you couldn’t pluck the kids out any time of the year to go across country.”

Now that the Morris’ oldest daughter is 15, the family is preparing her for a more regimented college schedule by enrolling part time in a private school. The older children also plan to learn Spanish at a community college. While some parents may wonder whether the freedom and opportunity translates into legitimate learning, Debbie proudly recites a more traditional measure of achievement to which all parents can relate: her children’s impressive test scores.

As home-schooling grows, so does the participation of ethnic minorities. Young estimates that 5 percent of North Carolina home-schoolers are black. Another 1 to 2 percent are Hispanic, and because that demographic group is growing so rapidly, NCHE is preparing to launch an initiative with El Hogar Educador, a Mexico-based group, to bring Spanish-language home-schooling materials to North Carolina. “You’ve got to learn English, but while you’re getting that up to standard, you can be learning in Spanish,” Young said.

Donna Martinez is associate editor of Carolina Journal.