Is It About the Money or Educational Excellence?

You can tell when a program transfers from being about educational excellence and affordability to a money-maker. A primary way is when editions change for no apparent reason. Elementary math doesn't evolve, and history facts do not either--at least they shouldn't. When I started Classical Conversations, the story was that we would make purchases once and it would last the duration. Why shouldn't it? Memorizing facts is the crux of the Foundations program. Do Latin endings and science sentences actually to morph?

It felt like a bait and switch when the program started to come out with new CD's and guides every 3 yrs. Editing errors were a legitimate reason for updates, but that surely could be resolved once and for all, I'd think. A Beka math as well as other big name companies change every few years and really, there is no reason other than wanting to cut back on people using 'used' items which they buy privately from other homeschoolers, or families being able to easily use the same materials for all their kids.

I can't heartily recommend any program that lets the almighty dollar cause homeschoolers to put out more money than they were initially led to believe they'd have to spend. With companies that merely sell materials, it is to be expected, but with a program like CC, where I've seen no benefit after nearly 6 yrs in the program, it is frustrating and has changed the way I see the program. I still think rote memory work is critical, still think a CC community is a valuable place to make friends that may have some things in common, and am still seeing benefits of doing it. I'm less trusting, however, when a program is driven by money, so recommend evaluating it heavily in the years beyond Foundations.

**updated to say, if you are entering any program, take a hard look at what the core "Christian" beliefs are. I was surprised to find how many CC communities consider Catholics to be Christian. CC uses Henley Latin, which is a very Catholic way to teach Latin. My children began Latin in 3rd or 4th grade, and it is entirely possible to have it taught from a non-Catholic perspective. Also, even though CC teaches science from a creation perspective, do not assume everyone in the community holds to that belief and that may come out during presentations that other children do. The phrase 'like-minded' is educationally based, otherwise, there would not be Mormon's in the program.