Unschooling is an unconventional choice for anyone. But for many people of color, and particularly for Asian Americans like me, unschooling is not just unconventional; it’s downright bananas.
Formal education is presented to generations of Chinese children as the golden ticket to success. To the Asian immigrant, it’s lauded as the path to assimilation and affluence.
“Why would you give up your chance for upward mobility after all we’ve sacrificed for you?” say my ancestors as they roll over in their graves.
Asian American unschoolers require support and fortitude as we go against the tide of Asian expectations, fight against racist stereotypes, and expose the whitewashed narratives we’ve been told.
Resisting the Cultural Pressures
The Chinese have a deep reverence for education. A thousand years before America even existed, China already had the imperial exams, an intense series of examinations that determined who could join the ranks of the state bureaucracy. This tradition has influenced much of East Asian attitudes toward education—the passing of a test is the ultimate sign of achievement and seal of approval.
Parents praying for high scores on their children’s college entrance exam
My own parents saw formal education as a doorway out of poverty and a necessary badge for success. They left Hong Kong for the States so my dad could pursue a master’s degree, and then a Ph.D. They intentionally moved to neighborhoods with good schools. That my siblings and I would go to college was an unspoken given.
In light of these cultural and familial expectations, choosing to unschool is profoundly counter-cultural for many second-generation Asian Americans like me. I have to resist the doubts and fears not only from within but also from without as my family and community question my choice. A quality public school is considered the best value. A private school is a good option if you have the means. Homeschooling can be considered, especially if your child is gifted or has learning challenges.
But unschooling? There’s no box for that.
Still, my reasons for unschooling are more compelling than my cultural scripts. I don’t want my children to be scored, tested, and evaluated at every turn, believing that their worth is tied to their performance and the judgment of others. I want my children to learn through life, grow strong in the freedom of my acceptance, and have a sense of their own identity so that they can go out into the world and resist those damaging messages.
Resisting the Stereotypes
Many Asian Americans feel that traditional school is working for their families. Their children seem to be thriving in a system that rewards the areas in which Asian Americans stereotypically excel—academics. Schools say, “Jump,” and we say, “How high.” Schools set the bar, and we strive to exceed it. We feel very little incentive to reform or abolish a system that benefits us.
In contrast, a growing number of black and brown families are unschooling because they recognize the system is not working for them. Students of color are disproportionately disciplined and discriminated against. Akilah Richards, an advocate for self-directed education, has a podcast to specifically discuss the “fears and the fares (costs) of raising free black and brown children in a world that tends to diminish, dehumanize, and disappear them.”
But while East Asian Americans do not necessarily deal with the same labels, we still have to resist racist stereotypes—assumptions that we are all inherently smart, quiet, good at math, unathletic, submissive, etc. Asian Americans students who want to explore and express the fullness of their personhood and their myriad of interests are not often given equal opportunity in sports, drama, the arts, leadership, etc., especially in majority white schools and communities. Instead, they’re expected to stay in their lane.
Unschooling allows my children to pursue their interests without being typecast or judged. They can be really into robotics without being labeled “Asian nerds.” They can try out for the lead in a community play because they’ve never been told that they aren’t leading man material. They can be bolstered by my belief in them rather than burdened by society’s distrust and skepticism.
A self-directed education means we don’t have to play by the unfair rules of a racist system, but can proactively create communities, opportunities, and experiences that defy the stereotypes. It means we as Asian Americans stand in solidarity against educational inequality against all people of color.
Resisting the Colonization of Our Education
Sad to say, but the worldview that we’ve been fed through the school system is undoubtedly skewed to represent the story of white patriarchy. People of color have few opportunities to learn of their own histories through their own lenses rather than through the white gaze. Many of my Asian American friends and I did not know the depths of discrimination against our people until we took classes in college.
This whitewashing affects pretty much every aspect of school life: literature, art, music, student government, sports, even the SATs—all center the white experience.
Homeschooling curriculum is not necessarily much better. Many—like those grounded in classical education—are created by and for white families. They are based on Western models, the white Western canon, and a version of history that is rooted in white supremacy.
Unschooling allows me to go off-script and introduce my children to an entire world of people and perspectives not taught in Western schools (nor in religiously fundamentalist homeschooling curriculum, for that matter)—stories and experiences that are relevant to them as ethnically Chinese individuals and global citizens. Instead of swallowing whole the spoon-fed narrative, we get to savor the stories that resonate with us, taste the wealth of flavors beyond the white palate, and discern for ourselves what to absorb and what to spit out.
Living outside the U.S. especially affords my family with the perspective that white is not always right, nor is the States always great. There is value in other non-American models and viewpoints. By opening ourselves to, celebrating, and critiquing different cultural norms and narratives, we resist the underlying nationalism and ethnocentrism in the stories taught to our children.
Unschooling means something different to people of color than it does to white families. It means something different to Asian Americans. For me personally, unschooling means daring to defy both Asian and white expectations, and daring to define my own path.
It is not merely a personal choice. It is a social commentary. A protest against racism. A liberatory practice.
It is an act of resistance.
7 Responses
Very interesting commentary.
My youngest was telling me just a few days ago about one of the passages from a Grace Lin book where the main character wants to try out for Dorothy in the school’s Wizard of Oz production and her best friend tells her that’s not an option, since she’s Asian.
I’d note that there are differences and similarities in experiences in different groups. My family is very white — 75% Scots and Irish American. But some of the same factors come in from the Irish side, which is a few generations in from immigration. Irish immigrants very much pushed for upward mobility (the stereotype of the Irish police officer came from the many Irish who used the police force to move up in class and income during “no Irish need apply” eras). My great-grandparents worked a quarry, my grandmother went to “normal” school so she could teach and send her sons out of town to a Catholic private school — scrimped and saved and lived 13 to a house sort of thing. My dad graduated from college and was an officer and he made sure his kids had a good education (two have higher degrees, now). We don’t unschool as such, but taking anything but the path of “find the best school you can afford and work hard to get perfect grades” has caused a lot of anxiety and stress.
In reality, this can be the next step in the same idea — we are grateful for what our family has worked to give us, and we make our own sacrifices to give our kids that and more, the things we couldn’t have ourselves. Homeschooling and unschooling are opportunities my parents and grandparents never had.
I don’t fault my parents or the generations before us for making the choices they did. They were doing the best they could! Like you said, they sacrificed so that we could have a better life and more freedom, so I’m going for it! 🙂
I agree!
Wow. Totally get this. I started off giving them expectations of: good behaviour in school, good grades, if you’re going to do something, do it well, put them in piano, kung fu and math class… And now… I’m realizing that I want them to: have fun, try things and figure what they like and don’t like, have good judgment (which you can only have if you have made bad judgment calls), take risks… and be okay with being bad at something as long as we figure out what we learned from that experience. I’m no longer yelling about spilled milk, rather, I’m always saying, yup, things happen, but is there something we could do differently for next time? I also used to get mad when they didn’t get along, as if being quiet and cooperative was the most important thing in the world (well, that’s how I got kudos, both for my own behaviour as a child and when my children were ‘guai’), but now, I let them argue, but then we deconstruct things, like, well, I’m not asking you to agree with the other person… but at least can you sort of understand why he might feel that way? That’s all I ask, don’t just see this from your one perspective.
Sounds like you’re on your way to untigering! Parenting provides many learning growth opportunities, for both us AND our kids!
I’m more of an untigering Asian dad and I agree with everything you said in the entry. People of East Asian descent carry a ton of cultural baggage when it comes to education so unschooling is probably too radical for most of us, until we start looking at the past with a critical eye. Just because something has been done for a thousand years doesn’t make it right or relevant for modern times.
Yes! Now that we know better, we can do better. Even as Asians, we can consciously choose unschooling despite the cultural hurdles and traditions that we need to overcome. If you’re considering unschooling, please let me know how I can support you!