Home Is Where the Truth Is by Maeve Jemison

8/3/2025

Why You Can and Should Homeschool Your Child

Speaker and podcaster Maeve Jemison introduces us to her debut book on Amazon, “Home Is Where The Truth Is”:
Today’s youth have a lot going against them as they trudge onto their school campuses. Sitting in cold, hard desks they’re force-fed facts that quickly zap the joy of discovery right out of them. Next, they’re indoctrinated with progressive ideologies meant to sexualize them and incite hatred for America. The fear of a gunman kicking in their classroom door constantly looms in the back of their mind. This is the loneliest, most anxious, and depressed young generation our world has possibly ever seen. Oh, and on top of all that...they might not really be a boy or a girl.
You can keep subjecting your kids to the poison, or you can bring them home to flourish. This book gives you the pro tips and encouragement to discover what millions of other parents already have: the best thing for their families is to take back control of their lives and their children’s education.
So what’s stopping you?

• You fear that your children won’t be adequately socialized?
• You don’t have the patience, organizational skills, or time?
• Homeschoolers are just weird!

This book dispels those lies and fifteen others that society erroneously believes. Ahead of you awaits a family bond you never imagined possible, and the role of primary guide for your child down the path God created them for. Even though it starts in your living room, this mission will be far-reaching. At the very least, your impact will be felt down to your grandchildren’s generation. At most, to all of eternity.

This wonderful book pulls back the curtain and exposes the lies that people have spread about homeschooling!
The author presents a logical case for the explosion of homeschooling in recent years. She shares her and others' experiences as she carefully deals with each misconception about homeschooling. She offers a lot of good advice and practical tips to be a successful homeschooling parent.
Being flexible is key.

You can buy this book:
https://www.amazon.com/Home-Where-Truth-Should-Homeschool-ebook
https://www.goodreads.com/home-where-truth
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/home-is-where-the-truth-is-maeve-jemison

You can connect with the author:
https://maevejemison.com/
podcast links on her website.
https://www.instagram.com/maevejemison

Copyright © 2025 Mark L. Schultz, except for the author’s introduction

36 Comments

Maeve Jemison link

8/5/2025 10:16:29 am

Hey, thanks Word Refiner! I hope to encourage parents who are considering homeschooling or are already doing it.

Mark

8/5/2025 10:25:11 am

You are welcome, Maeve. I enjoyed reading your book, and our daughter is homeschooling the two younger girls, 9 and 11. I help them whenever they need.

First question.

Please, tell us more about yourself. Perhaps something a little bit beyond your bio.

8/5/2025 10:37:49 am

I'm a graduate of a government school and a former high school journalism teacher.

I didn't even know homeschooling was a thing until I saw a cute little family at our church. The kids were so respectful, and the family shared a bond that I had never seen before. They volunteered for ministries as a family. I immediately knew that I wanted some of that for my family.

Since then, homeschooling has been a grand family adventure for us! We travel and learn together, and support each other's athletic endeavors.

It's not always easy; at times, I am downright frustrated and snippy. But it's so worth it!

When I'm not homeschooling or at a kids' athletic event, I'm reading, writing, shopping or enjoying a tequila craft cocktail.

8/5/2025 12:19:27 pm

I am a graduate of government schools, also. Schools have changed so dramatically since I started the first grade. I remember hiding under my desk for a bomb drill. I remember starting a school day with prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance.

Thank you for sharing more of your story.

New questions.

Are you a full-time or part-time writer?

What kind of work do you do if you are a part-time writer? Feel free to skip that question if you would rather not answer.

8/5/2025 12:35:05 pm

I didn’t have any bomb drills, but always enjoyed a fire drill to get out of class. Sadly, now they have active shooter drills. Scary stuff! Get your kids out of there.

When you say part time or full time, let’s just say that I’m writing in the nooks and crannies of my days and setting aside Tuesday nights as writing time. I’m home educating an elementary, middle and two high schoolers. So that’s full time. I also write and produce our podcast, and have four kids in sports. Just picture me hiding in my office anytime I get a few minutes to myself. ( However, my office has a glass door, which was a terrible idea by whomever designed it, and my kids are quick to find me to ask me something trivial thereby destroying my focus.) I wouldn’t have it any other way!

8/5/2025 01:17:46 pm

Btw, our podcast is growing in listenership. We would love people to stop by. It’s called: Homeschooling for Catholic parents. (All denominations are welcome!)

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/homeschooling-for-catholic-parents/id1728149929?i=1000720473178

Craig Crawford

8/6/2025 10:58:08 pm

Hi there. I find this topic interesting. I grew up much like Mark--in a school system in Iowa that was really in the top of the country for education at the time. It was organized and focused on learning and didn't put up with a lot of shenanigans. I do remember him talking about being in high school when the riots were going on and a group of kids started marching through the halls yelling and banging on classroom doors and the school did nothing but tell the teachers to keep their doors locked. Ridiculous.

Here the schools systems have slipped--my kid is in college, and he had to deal with Covid in high school but public schools do not seem to focus on education anymore. Either that or it has almost become secondary to social issues.

Question--do you think this has been a slow erosion in the education system or have there been key factors that shoved it in that direction? Thanks :)

Craig

8/5/2025 02:24:17 pm

Yes, active shooter drills are scarier!

You are certainly busy, Maeve. But it is worth it to see your kids turn out normally. No question about that. Congratulations on your podcast growth!

New questions.

What are your three favorite genres to read for pleasure?

Has writing changed the pleasure of reading for you?

8/5/2025 06:56:51 pm

Oh great questions! My favorite genres are nonfiction, historical fiction, and biographies of saints.

As a writer, I cannot read without my highlighter handy. I’m always on the lookout for amazing historical facts, miracles, analogies, and allegories to share with my readers. Sorry if I ever let you borrow one of my books because it’s going to have more neon highlights than an 80s punk band stage costume.

8/6/2025 08:17:11 am

We share a love of historical fiction. Hist-fic is my third favourite genre after sci-fi first and fantasy second. Cozy mysteries are next. Truthfully, I love reading almost any well-written book, whether fiction or non-fiction.

We moved to Florida in April of 2021 and could not bring many books with me. I do most of my reading on my Kindle Fire. I like making notes also.

New questions.

How has writing changed your life?

Do you journal?

8/7/2025 02:01:53 pm

Craig, I’m so sorry to hear that your child had to deal with covid in the public school system. My heart breaks for those kids that lost out on so much! Thanks for your great question that has a very long answer. In fact, a few books have been written about the history of America’s government schools. Here’s what I see as the key factors: firstly, the Prussian model that our schools are fashioned after was created to dumb down students to a standard citizenry that cannot act “other than the government wills it to act”. So that’s the foundational problem since early 1900s.

Then you have the sexual revolution of the 60s and the advent of SEICUS, which was the vehicle to get sex ed into schools and start it at a young age. Then in the 80s and 90s activists started a campaign meant to normalize homosexuality and transgenderism through curriculum and hypersexualize children through mandated sexual ed.

What we are seeing now, for example, males using female’s bathrooms and competing in women’s sports, or teachers who secretly help students transition without parents’ knowledge—didn’t just suddenly pop up. It’s been a long indoctrination process. Parents are waking up, thankfully!

What’s interesting is that up until the 1900s education was always about educating the whole person which includes morals and good character. Don’t we all need prudence, wisdom, perseverance and self-control?

When you take morals out of education, you’re left with a shallow, entitled person who is guided by whatever feels good in the moment.

Alex Newman wrote a couple of great books on the history of education. One is called crimes of the educators and the other is called indoctrinating our children to death. I also did write a lot about this in my book. If you want to check it out!

8/7/2025 04:58:31 pm

Thank you! For my son--basically he had to sit through 7 zoom meetings back to back all day. It was dumb and he was bored to death. I couldnt take that...let alone a kid.

And yeah education has always been an indoctrination to degrees. The agendas seem to have over taken everything.

8/7/2025 02:08:25 pm

Hist-fic! Love the lingo! I’m going to start using that. Yes, Mark, you are a bibliophile to the Nth!

Writing has changed my life because it gives me more life’s purpose. “Dedicate your work to the Lord and it shall prosper.” Everything that I write, I hope will glorify God.

Yes! I journal! If I did not journal I would forget so many great analogies and one liners and things that pop into my head. I always have a journal, handy or nearby.

Recently, I’ve started journaling with my prayer time, which makes it so much easier to communicate with and get answers from God through my pen and paper.

8/7/2025 04:44:22 pm

I do love books, and I learned to read before starting my public school education in the first grade. A retired teacher lived behind us and she taught me to read with the Dick and Jane books. I have never stopped reading.

New questions.

Who was the first person to inspire you to write something to publish?

What inspired you to write this book?

8/7/2025 05:35:20 pm

Dick and Jane books for the win! 🙌

I remember learning with those too!

I love this question, because it allows me to honor my mom’s memory. She’s been in Heaven for 26 years now. She taught me to write. I still remember when we went from a typewriter to a word processor. It was so cool!

She would write articles and send them out to magazines like Country Living. I remember the rejection letters, but also the acceptance letters and the $50 check that followed six weeks later. Once she made the masthead of a magazine as a regular contributor and she nearly danced a jig. We had celebratory dessert that night!

Ahh. I miss my momma. Thank God she passed on her writing skills.

God inspired me to write a book. He had been pressing on my heart for years. When it finally came time to sit down and write. The only thing I really knew about was homeschooling. I praise him for the journey it’s been!

8/7/2025 05:13:24 pm

Craig,
Ugh! 7 zoom meetings is intolerable! Especially for kids, right?! That’s so true…our bosses would never expect that of us! That’s one silver lining to COVID, millions of families realized what garbage that their kids were being fed, and are STILL homeschooling to this day.

8/7/2025 05:54:48 pm

What a wise mom you had. Thank you for honoring her work and memory.

My mom loved to read and I thank her for passing on the love of books. As a little boy, I got so excited when mail arrived for me. Relatives were sending me books for my birthday and Christmas. I didn't realize then that my mom had a hand in that.

New question.

Will you keep writing in this genre or will you branch out?

8/7/2025 07:04:46 pm

Oh yeah, us moms are always working behind the scenes! And look how it’s shaped you, that’s the beautiful and poignant thing about homeschooling, daily we are helping our children find the gifts and passions that the Lord has instilled in them. The talents and skills that they will use to bless those around them, and hopefully, change the world for the better.

All parents can do this. But as home educators who are with our children all day, every day of their lives, we aren’t outsourcing this great calling. Instead, we work as a tool in the hands of the creator of all things. Pretty awesome gig.

8/8/2025 07:39:46 am

We are products of many different influences over the course of our life. We, in turn, influence those around us. So very true.

New question.

Have you ever seen a UFO or UAP, Unidentified Aerial Phenomena?

8/8/2025 07:49:57 am

Have you been reading Sci-fi again? Haha, no I haven’t. But I used to binge watch alien abduction and Area 51 documentaries!

8/8/2025 08:11:37 am

I do read a lot of science fiction, no doubt. Those things fascinate me also.

My sisters tell me we saw a UFO when we were children, but I have no recollection of that event.

There is a distinct dark side of UFOs. For more enlightening information about that I can recommend "Crash Go The Chariots" by Clifford Wilson.

New question.

Have you ever seen a cryptid, an animal unknown to modern zoologists, or found evidence of one?

8/9/2025 05:54:51 am

Like Bigfoot or a mermaid? No, have you??

But what’s odd is that question evoked a memory from when I was around 7 or 8 years old. I grew up in the woods of Oklahoma. One afternoon of exploring, I looked under a leaf and saw the most peculiar little ant-eater looking creature. He was about the size of a baby mouse. With smooth reptilian brown skin. He had a long proboscis that hung out in front of him as he walked on all fours. I never could identify it or have ever seen anything like him in a picture or video.

8/9/2025 08:14:50 am

I have not, though a lot of the kids in my high school claimed to have an uncle who saw Bigfoot. I was skeptical then and have not changed my mind.

I don't doubt that some animals have not been found yet.

Is there any chance your creature could have been a baby armadillo?

New question.

How many drafts did your book go through before publishing?

8/9/2025 04:19:17 pm

Yes, I believe there are lots of species out there still to be discovered. My dad, who is a devout Creationist, says that God can still create new species if he wants to and might still be creating. I believe that!

I looked up a picture of a baby armadillo. That couldn't have been it. The thing I saw didn't have that body armor and was much smaller. But good guess!

My book only went through one draft with lots of minor and grammatical edits, of course.

8/9/2025 04:48:50 pm

Sorry, my guess didn't answer your dilemma. It was a long shot at best.

Some authors write in a similar fashion. They keep working on the same draft over and over. They don't declare a second or third draft. Other authors may have eight to twelve drafts. The comments of an alpha reader may generate the third and fourth draft. The comments from beta readers may cause another draft or two. Many authors take some time between each draft also. Doing this makes errors easier to find. After sending whatever draft to an editor, will likely generate another draft for all of the changes. After letting some dust accumulate, figuratively speaking, another draft is created. Most authors might consider the book ready to publish. But the manuscript needs to go to a proofreader for a final polish. Somebody like me. I know many authors don't do that because I find spelling errors in 95% of published books I read.

New questions.

Who designed the cover of your book? Feel free to drop a copy-and-paste link if appropriate.

How many drafts did the cover go through?

8/9/2025 06:58:58 pm

I believe it! You found some errors in my book! Thanks for pointing them out. You truly have an impressive gift. Four other proofreaders missed them. These proofreaders were friends of mine, highly educated, writers themselves, but we all missed them. Way to go, Mark!

My cover went through three drafts with as many artists. I was so blessed to have Jenneth Dyck produce the final masterpiece. I was very stressed because the other artists had created exactly what I asked for, but then I abhorred the outcome. Nothing against their skills; they were competent. It was entirely my fault; I thought I knew what I wanted, but I didn't. It's like a meme that I saw the other day, "Thank God he didn't give me what I thought I wanted."

So, with Jenneth, I gave her freedom to do whatever her creative mind came up with. Then waited and prayed.

I remember the exact moment when I received her email with the cover. I was sitting in traffic at a red light. I prayed, "Please Lord, let me like it."

And when I opened the attachment, I was blown away, relieved. Ecstatic. I loved it!

8/9/2025 07:54:46 pm

Thank you. I love to read, and the spelling errors jump off the page at me.

You hit paydirt with the fourth artist. Congratulations. A cover is so important and such a subjective experience. If the author doesn't love it, they should keep trying as you did.

New questions.

Was it hard to come up with the title?

What was the process?

8/10/2025 01:18:43 pm

The title was the most difficult thing! I couldn’t find one with panache or a ring to it. It was actually holding up the production. I tried asking AI, which actually came up with some good ones, but none of those had soul.

Then my husband and cohost of the podcast, Mat who loves a good cliche better than a fat kid loves cake threw it out there in a brainstorming session. As soon as he said it, we knew it was perfect.

8/10/2025 02:40:06 pm

I am not surprised that it took some time to find the right title. Good job, Matt!

Titles are important; they are usually the first or second thing a shopper sees. Title length goes in and out of favor over time. Three-word titles were the standard for quite a while, then they were shortened to two words and now one-word titles are very popular. It's asking a lot of even AI to come up with a good title in one word.

You bucked the trend with a six-word title quite well.

New question.

Had you written and published any short stories before writing your book?

8/10/2025 05:20:37 pm

Oh, that’s really interesting about trending title lengths.

Thanks!

I had published one article in an online surf magazine about my Dad becoming the east coast champion in the Grand-Masters division of his amateur surf organization. He was paddling against 20 foot waves after a hurricane!

That’s it. Other than that I wrote to earn my journalism degree, then used that degree to teach high schoolers to write and produce the Deland high yearbook.

I learned a ton about writing through authoring the book. It was a wonderful journey of learning and growing. Always working on those analogies and metaphors!

8/10/2025 06:32:57 pm

That is cool about your dad.

Yearbooks are a lot of fun and a good introduction to writing and publishing for high school students. I was on the yearbook project in my high school. I had a nice camera and took a lot of casual pictures around the class in our junior year.

New questions.

Have you ever written any fan fiction?

If so, what storyline were you mimicking or following?

Maeve Jemison

8/10/2025 06:39:10 pm

No I haven’t. I didn’t even know what fanfic was until I just looked it up to answer your question, Mark.

If I did though it would be about Katniss Everdeen.

8/11/2025 02:08:39 pm

You're a Hunger Games fan. I have seen the movie. Our daughter and her girls are pretty big fans of the movie. She is also a big fan of Twilight. Parts of it were filmed in my old high school. I graduated before those actors were even born. I tried to watch the movie and I refrained from making many negative comments. Truthfully, it made little sense to me.

Fanfic is a great way to learn about writing. Copying an author's style necessitates studying the writing to some extent. A fair amount can be absorbed without having to understand all of the nuances at that time. The understanding will come later if the writing continues.

Last questions.

Do you write a script for your podcasts?

Are you going to write more books?

8/11/2025 04:36:27 pm

That's so funny about Twilight. I remember when it first came out. Even my own daughters admit that it doesn't make much sense, but they had to watch the movies because of pop culture.

I wish my book would catch on like that! Mine does make sense, I promise. And Mark can attest, right Mark?😆

My teacher brain can see how fanfic is very helpful in learning. In fact, now that I reflect on my years as a public high school teacher, we often used articles or specific authors' pieces for students to model.

I used to write a script in the very beginning days of the podcast. But it sounded like I was reading, not speaking naturally. Then I got an amazing podcast coach who suggested I use an outline and leave room for the Holy Spirit. That's a lot more fun and easier. Although I am so MAD at myself when I forget to say a key point, and especially if I miss the chance to crack a joke. Because I do write those down.

Yes! I have more books in me! I want to write one about a fascinating Spaniard who explored the New World, Cabeza de Vaca. His survival was miraculous, his story unbelievable. I think it would make a great children's book.

Also, there is another fascinating story: In 1571, the battle of Lepanto, in which the Holy League defeated the Ottoman Empire, thereby saving Christendom in Europe and the center of the world at that time. The Catholic Church celebrates the Feast of Our Lady of Victory on October 7, because Pope Pius V attributed the victory to Mary's intercession. Leading up to the battle, he asked the faithful to pray the Rosary from dawn to dusk. It was indeed a miraculous victory as the Christian fleet was outnumbered nearly 3 to 1 by the fiercest army in the world, which no one had beaten up until that point. I see that one as a children's book as well.

I am currently working on a Catholic Homeschool Planner, which will be ready for next school year. So I'm having fun with that!

Ever proofread a calendar/planner? I need your keen eye, my friend.

8/11/2025 07:34:28 pm

Yes, your book makes more sense than many will admit.

The podcast coach gave you good advice. An outline of the important points are all that is needed much of the time.

Those books sound interesting. I love historical fiction. Hist-fic is my third favorite genre.

I would be happy to look a planner over. I find spelling errors on menus, so a planner will be doable.

Thank you, Maeve. It has been a pleasure to chat with you this week. I very much appreciate you hiring me to help promote your book. I have another promotion starting tomorrow, so I must bring this time to a close.

Until next time, keep on writing and homeschooling.

8/11/2025 08:05:31 pm

The pleasure was all mine, Mark!

Ok, I will hit you up when the planner is complete in a month or two.

...and the other books, but that'll be a couple of years. Until then, keep reading and finding misspellings!

Home Is Where the Truth Is by Maeve Jemison

Why You Can and Should Homeschool Your Child

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