“If you flunk school, you flunk life.” “If your grades drop again, your grounded.” “Do you want to become a criminal dropout? No? Then study.” How many of you have heard this before? Most likely many times. And most likely you will many more times. Your parents, teachers, adult friends, grandparents, counselors. They say these things to you. Not because they are bad people, or you are stupid. Because they do not know any other way to help you succeed in life, and because they love you (most do!) and they are scared you will not be able to get a job and have a good life.

Is this article about sucking it up and doing better in school? No! It’s not. This is to show you that all those hours of school you do every week, probably around forty if your in middle school and forty-five to fifty if your in high school, all those long, dull hours you sit hunched over a desk, they have no worth. (Well, most of them anyway.) Dang, you wasted a lot of time! I am NOT crazy. I am completely serious. If you know someone who is homeschooled, then ask how many hours of school work they do in one week. For most homeschoolers, the number of hours they actually work on ‘school’ is about six per week or less, depending on the area and person. Many homeshoolers take the same standardized tests as you every year. I do, and I have have been homeschooling for almost ten years. My test results are pretty good.

What I am trying to say here is: school and learning are not the same. Your not stupid. Think about it. What have you really learned at school? Okay, maybe you know the year the declaration of independence was written(though, I learned it from reading fiction, not from a history text book.) You probably know some stuff from school. But those endless hours of homework, and tests don’t really teach you anything. Really. Trust me. But I study all the time and do really well on my tests because I KNOW stuff! You say. Yes. It’s true. You studied, and took the test. But after the test, you most likely forgot almost everything you had just skipped a party to learn. Sorry to break it to you, but school is not teaching you anything except how to be a good little factory worker and obey orders from those higher up.

The founders of Apple, Windows and Microsoft where dropouts. Jessica Watson, the youngest person ever to sail solo, none-stop and unassisted around the world is homeschooled. Mark Twain, William Shakespeare, Beatrice Potter, and Benjamin Franklin. All homeschooled. The point is: if you want to learn something, than you will. If you want to go through your homework fast so you can go out and bike, than you won’t. I could go on and on. A book could be written on this topic. Hey, it has! Blake boles: College Without High School is a great book that will change your life. Read it if you are sick of school and bored with life. You will be saved.