Posted on 06/18/2005 8:15:49 AM PDT by Graybeard58
Before the parade passes her by, Tiffany Hasley will stand up for her right to perform with the Beatrice High School marching band. She'll be on the corner of 13th and Court streets in Beatrice at 8:30 a.m. this morning, all lined up for today's Homestead Days Parade.
Clarinet in hand, standing tall in her stiff new band shoes, she plans to leave quietly when school officials tell her she cannot march. Because the home-schooled eighth-grader does not want to make a scene, just a point. That is: Home-school students should be allowed to participate in any public school activity, as long as they pay taxes and live within the school district.
"I'm not in tears," she said. "But I'm kind of mad. My band teacher says I'm a good student. And I am first-chair clarinet."
Beatrice High School officials told Tiffany last month that she would not be able to participate in band next year as a ninth-grader. The school bars home-school students from being in activities regulated by the Nebraska School Activities Association.
Tiffany's parents, Ron and Vicki Hasley, plan to fight the school's decision, maybe even in court. But, at least for this summer, they figured she could still play with the band.
That's not the case, they learned Wednesday when band director Bruce Greenwell told Tiffany just before practice that Superintendent Dale Kruse decided she should sit out Saturday's parade. On Friday, the Hasleys received a formal letter from Kruse stating the same.
"They say she isn't registered, but no one has to be registered until school starts this fall," said Ron Hasley. "Really, quote me that policy. Show me that statute."
Both Kruse and BHS activities director Randy Coleman were unavailable for comment Friday.
But Roger Harris, attorney for the Beatrice school board, said the decision is consistent with school policy. No one can play in the band unless they are registered, full-time students at the school, he said.
"Even though marching in the parade is an informal thing, it's not open to just anyone," Harris said.
"Say a student from Wymore wanted to march. Would anyone care? Probably not. But the perception is, ‘This is the Beatrice High School band,' and we have to protect that."
Whether homeschool students can be in marching band is at the discretion of each school, said Jim Tenopir, director of the NSAA.
Band members can practice or perform at non-NSAA events such as parades or high school football games. But for competitive activities, the NSAA only allows students from accredited schools to compete against other students.
NSAA eligibility rules ensure that high school students keep up their grades and attend school regularly, or they cannot compete, Tenopir said.
Enforcing the very specific and rigid rules among homeschoolers would be impossible, he said.
"You are probably not going to hear a parent say, ‘I caught my kid smoking so please don't let him play football,'" Tenopir said.
But some state senators would like to change both school policies and NSAA rules to include homeschool students.
Legislative bills addressing that issue have been introduced for the past few years, most recently by Sens. Phil Erdman and Mike Foley. But none of the bills have made it out of committee.
Ron Hasley said he's "a constitution kind of guy," who will pursue the issue, not only for his daughter but for other homeschool students.
"I pay taxes," he said. "I'm asking for a service, and I'm not getting it. I hope what happens here sets precedence for the state."
Schools sponsor extracurricular activities for the benefit of their students. Not the community at large, and not kids from neighboring districts. Schools serve as community hubs (e.g., they're usually polling places), but that's a secondary function.
If you allow a home-schooler to march in the band, by what rationale do you deny a 17-year-old dropout a spot on the football team? If you open activities to kids who aren't enrolled in any classes, how can you bar students who are failing their classes?
If the activities are a right of taxpayers, how can you kick someone out of the band or off the team just because he's been expelled from school? Don't his parents still pay taxes?
Where I live, students with failing grades aren't allowed to participate in sports; my senior year (back when dinosaurs ruled the Earth), one school had to retroactively forfeit four games because an academically ineligible player was on the team. The same was true of any competitive event, from debate tournaments to band competitions.
My teachers had to forward my grades to the band director, and there was some heated negotiation one time when I had a three-day in-house suspension that would have overlapped with a band tournament. The band teacher managed to convince the principal to defer the suspension to the following week rather than bench the principal tuba (laugh if you must, but our band won trophies and the football team didn't).
If you allow homeschoolers into extracurricular activities, you're placing school administrators in the position of vouching for their academic standing -- something of which they have no knowledge and over which they have no control. It might be possible to devise some means of measuring the academic achievement and progress of homeschooled students, but that would involve the kind of intrusion that I don't expect many homeschooling parents to accept.
The solution, as I see it, isn't to push to allow more people into school activities, but to push for more community activities that aren't tied to schools. If there are enough homeschoolers, adults and kids from small schools, you have the core of a community band. Once it gains a little momentum, kids from local public and private schools will decide to play there instead of or in addition to their school bands.
Well, to be honest, my dig on the school system is by no means a knee-jerk attack. I have carefully examined the institution that is public education, and have found it wanting in a few vital particulars. It may well be that, if you were aware of these particulars, you might re-evaluate the quality of your childrens' education.
As for my personal experience, I came out of the public school system fairly well educated, but only because my parents supplemented my school work with considerable coaching and one-on-one work at home. If you have taken similar steps with your children (as many conscientious parents do), then it may well be that your childrens' high-quality education has more to do with you, and less to do with the school, than you might at first think.
In parting, let me say that those who consider public schooling excellent may not have experienced how good education can potentially be.
Two reasons:
1. It's not likely that two hours of band practice will substantially affect your homeschooler's world view, and
2. It's difficult for a homeschooler to assemble the warm bodies and the equipment to field a marching band, and unwarranted when you're already paying the county to do it for you.
There are, in fact, things that public schools do better than homeschoolers...pretty much anything that involves large numbers of people and large sums of money. The public-school reaction to wall homeschoolers off from such resources is simple spite.
A chance to participate willingly in the socialist agenda? =]
They chose not to participate in school. That choice (in this area, at least) leads to not playing in the school band. Too bad. Choices have consequences.
This reminds me of very liberal parents... no matter what, MY child should be allowed to do X, Y, Z because I WANT her to!
Parents are a home schooled kids teacher. The school would need to respect their standards of what academic success is, just like they would a public school teachers standards.
Public schools offer the use of instruments and amps that not all people would be able to purchase if they wanted to organize a community band. Homeschooling parents pay taxes for those instruments. Their kids should be eligible to use them if they want to.
...and band trips.
But the point is that if you needed their services they were there for you. apples and oranges
Yep.
YOu can be certain that if this was an athletic male and an extremely talented, superstar football player, they'd have NO PROBLEM allowing him to play on the team!
If a kid home schools and also wants to participate in the band, they ARE choosing to participate in that school. What is happening in your district is that they are being denied the opportunity to participate.
That choice (in this area, at least) leads to not playing in the school band. Too bad. Choices have consequences.
You're right. The choice that certain public schools are making (not letting certain children participate in public school activities) is eventually going to lead to more and bigger lawsuits against them and the state or federal government....and then everyone will have to pay for the consequences - including you.
Exactly. In this situation, the services are needed and they are not being supplied...
I agree
Why not?
-- James Baldwin
Our homeschoolers didn't have a band per se, but they had a small bagpipe group. The HS let them march in the homecoming parade as they let all the community participate in it. They put the bagpipers right in front behind the color guard. The teacher in charge of the parade said that there was just something majestic about the bagpipes and thought that they should be with the colors. The HS band was way back in the parade. The crowd went wild when the pipers marched by. These kids were competitive bagpipers, all homeschooled and could play the HS band into the ground. It was probably a good thing that the regular band was far from them.
These kids are now all in college and most of them a couple years ahead of their peers.
Went through this about 10 years ago on behalf of home-schooled athletes, a group in even greater need of "integration" than band-musicians. There's absolutely no logic on the side of public school administrators and teachers in this argument; yet they insist--most often even to their own detriment--to keep the home-schooled isolated from the institution-schooled. Band directors are frequently faculty-members and MIGHT be forgiven for refusing to allow outside musicians, students with whom they have no class-time, to take up limited after-school practice-time learning the director's idiosyncratic signals (easily absorbed in the classroom).
It's far easier for coaches (most of whom nowadays are separate hires anyway) to accept nonresidents on teams because ALL practices are outside the classroom. YET, public school administrators WILL NOT allow home-schooled athletes to participate! It's particularly galling because 1) great athletes aren't limited to the public-school system (and the school could benefit greatly from the influx of more team-competition), and 2) home-schooled GREAT athletes have a much more difficult time getting NCAA athletic scholarships!
No, they are allowed to participate if they wish. The school will provide math, english, science, band, etc. The family decided that it wasn't good enough for their children... well until she wanted to play band, of course. Suddenly the crappy, pathetic, horrible, evil, public school is GOOD ENOUGH for their child.
You want to make the choices for your children? I say that is GREAT! Make any choice you want and have total control! I applaud you. I'll stand up and salute you! But you can't remake the entire world to suit yourself. Choices have consequences. This is one.
They are supplied, but the "price" is enrollment in school. They can decide to pay or not. It is fully up to them.
How about the question is, If they pay taxes for the facilities, teachers, and everything else in thier district probably including the band instruments and uniforms, why can't thier daughter take part?
They have every right to participate.
I don't think your example is a good parallel. A senior citizen can go to one center, fifteen different ones, or none at all. A child's attendance at school is mandatory in most states, and a child cannot be officially registered in multiple school districts.
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