Do Schools Have a Monopoly on Education?

Back when I was teaching Latin, a speaker came to the school where I taught and gave a rousing speech about the importance of education and the possibility of expanding our services to be even more effective educators. 

Later, I asked if I could meet one-on-one to run some of the ideas I had about Academic Life Coaching by him and get his thoughts.  

In that meeting, which lasted nearly three hours, he said, “I know this may sound heretical to the education model, but I don’t think of school as providing my child an education.  My wife and I are our children’s primary educators.  We merely outsource the teaching of a few subjects to teachers.”

He spoke to the heart of the matter: education doesn’t need a school to happen.  In fact, the most important lessons learned come from outside the walls of a classroom.  

So why do we rely so much on schools to provide what they’re ill-equipped to deliver?