Let me say, right off the bat, that there are quite a few home schoolers that have given this a bad name.  I was a teacher too- and saw some unfortunate results.  But not all by any means.

We are fortunate to be highly educated and able to make this decision for the family, but I worry for parents who haven't had the same opportunities we've had who have kids with similar needs.

I look forward to your insights!

I graduated from college last year, and I have two little sisters- 8 and 11 years younger than myself.  Because of some behavior problems they were having at school, my parents asked me to homeschool them for a year.  I can attest to you skepticism; my father is a chemist, and I studied the social sciences, and between the two of us we barely kept our heads above water.  Their finals are next week, and I'm confident that they will do well, but... what a year.  It's a relief to know that they'll be rejoining their public school next year.

We were successful under some rather particular circumstances.  We're a relatively nerdy family to begin with; my dad is a scientist who has no qualms about bringing his 'toys' home; we rejected almost every religious textbook we saw (impressive, because my parents are very conservative Christians); we have tons of homeschooling cousins and friends for advice and shared activities; and our school district is very supportive of homeschoolers.  Without those conditions having been met, I can't imagine what we would have done well this year.

For every decent homeschooling family I've met this year, I've also met three or four families who homeschool because they are afraid to let the 'secular liburl educrats' get their slimy tentacles into their poor innocent children.  I've met many couples with only highschool degrees trying to teach highschool material, and not understanding it themselves anymore.  Not only do the kids not learn the material, but they don't learn to value their education; if mom and dad don't think it's important, why should I?

Worse, the books from Bob Jones Publishing, which are standard for Christian conservative homeschoolers, are horrifying in their lack of content.  My 6th grade sister, who loves social studies, was thrilled about a Bob Jones book we found on world history; we didn't use it, because about a third of the book was spent explaining that the residents of such-and-such country were mostly going to hell because they weren't clones of American fundamentalists.  (That's not a made up number.  We measured the text at random intervals as a geometry assignment.)

This is getting really long, and I need to get school started, but I want to ask the question that prompted all this writing before I go: why, in areas where Christian fundamentalists control the school system, do liberal families not homeschool their children?  I'm not familiar with all the issues in Midwest and Southern schools (we live in upstate NY), but it sounds like the kids are being indoctrinated with fundamentalism.  If your kids are in this situation, how do you counteract it at home?