Howdy! My name's David - I'm looking for a cool project to fill time before I start a PhD. I have a BS in Mechanical & an MEng in Materials Science & Engineering. I spent the last two years with SpaceX, working on the Starship launch pad at Starbase. If you watched the April launch stream, you saw some of my work. Hit me up if you're looking for a mechanical/structural engineer to do some remote design work/first-principles research/consulting. Definitely open to part-time/contract opportunities as well.
Location: USA, Virginia, New River Valley
Remote: yes
Willing to relocate: no
Technologies: Ansys Mechanical, NX, Teamcenter, Matlab
I'm familiar with both Zubrin (two of his books within arms-reach as a I type this) and generally how NG/Innovation Systems does business (having worked at a legacy ATK plant).
I don't disagree that they often make money via cost-plus contracts, that SLS is mainly a jobs program, or any of that. What I disagree with is your apparent inherent assumption that it's malicious. Nobody's "milking" anything - Hanlon's razor, remember. Never assume malice when stupidity (I'd prefer "incompetence") is an adequate explanation. The project managers at ULA, at Boeing, at Lockheed, at Northrop, aren't monsters trying to squeeze more money from the taxpayer. They, quite simply, believe that this is the way you have to build a rocket and you can't possibly do it any cheaper. They do pride themselves on being able to deliver things ahead of schedule and under budget, except they can't because everybody expects projects to be behind schedule and over budget, since that's the way it's always gone. Traditional expectations have a stranglehold on the oldspace industry. I've also worked for a newspace company - there was none of that attitude.
Don't assume the astronautics primes are evil. They're just... old.
Let's not oversimplify or cast blame. Sure, most/all of the tech has been around for decades - although Lars Blackmore & the other controls engineers did original work that was arguably absolutely critical - but there hasn't been any milking going on. The most profitable route wouldv'e been to develop this tech & then use it, after all. [Case in point: SpaceX, of course.] There simply wasn't enough interest from the public or Congress to put enough R&D money into any number of cool programs to see them through to commercialization.
Weighing in with a personal account for added authenticity with the acknowledgement of bias.
I was homeschooled K-12, and my experience falls in line with what I've heard as the standard perspective: generally pretty average outcomes, possibly weighted toward greater academic success. High standardized test scores are normal. I'm surprised you've just assumed homeschooling is straight up less successful.