(NAME-MCE) Many Muslims Turn to Home Schooling

[Anselmo Villanueva]

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Many Muslims Turn to Home Schooling

By NEIL MacFARQUHAR  New York Times

Published: March 26, 2008

LODI, Calif. — Like dozens of other Pakistani-American girls here,
Hajra Bibi stopped attending the local public school when she reached
puberty, and began studying at home.

Her family wanted her to clean and cook for her male relatives, and
had also worried that other American children would mock both her
Muslim religion and her traditional clothes.

"Some men don't like it when you wear American clothes — they don't
think it is a good thing for girls," said Miss Bibi, 17, now studying
at the 12th-grade level in this agricultural center some 70 miles east
of San Francisco. "You have to be respectable."

Across the United States, Muslims who find that a public school
education clashes with their religious or cultural traditions have
turned to home schooling. That choice is intended partly as a way to
build a solid Muslim identity away from the prejudices that their
children, boys and girls alike, can face in schoolyards. But in some
cases, as in Ms. Bibi's, the intent is also to isolate their
adolescent and teenage daughters from the corrupting influences that
they see in much of American life.

About 40 percent of the Pakistani and other Southeast Asian girls of
high school age who are enrolled in the district here are
home-schooled, though broader statistics on the number of Muslim
children being home-schooled, and how well they do academically, are
elusive. Even estimates on the number of all American children being
taught at home swing broadly, from one million to two million.

No matter what the faith, parents who make the choice are often
inspired by a belief that public schools are havens for social ills
like drugs and that they can do better with their children at home.

"I don't want the behavior," said Aya Ismael, a Muslim mother
home-schooling four children near San Jose. "Little girls are walking
around dressing like hoochies, cursing and swearing and showing
disrespect toward their elders. In Islam we believe in respect and
dignity and honor."

Still, the subject of home schooling is a contentious one in various
Muslim communities, with opponents arguing that Muslim children are
better off staying in the system and, if need be, fighting for their
rights.

Robina Asghar, a Muslim who does social work in Stockton, Calif., says
the fact that her son was repeatedly branded a "terrorist" in school
hallways sharpened his interest in civil rights and inspired a dream
to become a lawyer. He now attends a Catholic high school.

"My son had a hard time in school, but every time something happened
it was a learning moment for him," Mrs. Asghar said. "He learned how
to cope. A lot of people were discriminated against in this country,
but the only thing that brings change is education."

Many parents, however, would rather their children learn in a less
difficult environment, and opt to keep them home.

Hina Khan-Mukhtar decided to tutor her three sons at home and to send
them to a small Muslim school cooperative established by some 15 Bay
Area families for subjects like Arabic, science and carpentry. She
made up her mind after visiting her oldest son's prospective public
school kindergarten, where each pupil had assembled a scrapbook titled
"Why I Like Pigs." Mrs. Khan-Mukhtar read with dismay what the
children had written about the delicious taste of pork, barred by
Islam. "I remembered at that age how important it was to fit in," she
said.

Many Muslim parents contacted for this article were reluctant to talk,
saying Muslim home-schoolers were often portrayed as religious
extremists. That view is partly fueled by the fact that Adam Gadahn,
an American-born spokesman for Al Qaeda, was home-schooled in rural
California.

"There is a tendency to make home-schoolers look like antisocial
fanatics who don't want their kids in the system," said Nabila Hanson,
who argues that most home-schoolers, like herself, make an extra
effort to find their children opportunities for sports, music or field
trips with other people.

Lodi's Muslims also attracted unwanted national attention when one
local man, Hamid Hayat, was sentenced last year to 24 years in prison
on a terrorism conviction that his relatives say was largely due to a
fabricated confession. (Had he been more Americanized, they say, he
would have known to ask for a lawyer as soon as the F.B.I. appeared.)

Parents who home-school tend to be converts, Mrs. Khan-Mukhtar said.
Immigrant parents she has encountered generally oppose the idea,
seeing educational opportunities in America as a main reason for
coming.

If so, then Fawzia Mai Tung is an exception, a Chinese Muslim
immigrant who home-schools three daughters in Phoenix. She spent many
sleepless nights worried that her children would not excel on
standardized tests, until she discovered how low the scores at the
local schools were. Her oldest son, also home-schooled, is now
applying to medical school.

In some cases, home-schooling is used primarily as a way to isolate
girls like Miss Bibi, the Pakistani-American here in Lodi.

Some 80 percent of the city's 2,500 Muslims are Pakistani, and many
are interrelated villagers who try to recreate the conservative social
atmosphere back home. A decade ago many girls were simply shipped back
to their villages once they reached adolescence.

"Their families want them to retain their culture and not become
Americanized," said Roberta Wall, the principal of the district-run
Independent School, which supervises home schooling in Lodi and where
home-schooled students attend weekly hourlong tutorials.

Of more than 90 Pakistani or other Southeast Asian girls of high
school age who are enrolled in the Lodi district, 38 are being
home-schooled. By contrast, just 7 of the 107 boys are being
home-schooled, and usually the reason is that they were falling behind
academically.

As soon as they finish their schooling, the girls are married off,
often to cousins brought in from their families' old villages.

The parents "want their girls safe at home and away from evil things
like boys, drinking and drugs," said Kristine Leach, a veteran teacher
with the Independent School.

The girls follow the regular high school curriculum, squeezing in
study time among housework, cooking, praying and reading the Koran.
The teachers at the weekly tutorials occasionally crack jokes of the
"what, are your brothers' arms broken?" variety, but in general they
tread lightly, sensing that their students obey family and tradition
because they have no alternative.

"I do miss my friends," Miss Bibi said of fellow students with whom
she once attended public school. "We would hang out and do fun things,
help each other with our homework."

But being schooled apart does have its benefit, she added. "We don't
want anyone to point a finger at us," she said, "to say that we are
bad."

Mrs. Asghar, the Stockton woman who argues against home schooling,
takes exception to the idea of removing girls from school to preserve
family honor, calling it a barrier to assimilation.

"People who think like this are stuck in a time capsule," she said.
"When kids know more than their parents, the parents lose control. I
think that is a fear in all of us."

Aishah Bashir, now an 18-year-old Independent School student, was sent
back to Pakistan when she was 12 and stayed till she was 16. She had
no education there.

Asked about home schooling, she said it was the best choice. But she
admitted that the choice was not hers and, asked if she would
home-school her own daughter, stared mutely at the floor. Finally she
said quietly: "When I have a daughter, I want her to learn more than
me. I want her to be more educated."