Schwarzenegger denounces 'outrageous' homeschooling ruling

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 3/7/2008 | Jill Tucker and Bob Egelko

[GVnana]

(03-07) 13:37 PST SACRAMENTO -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger promised today to ensure that parents have the right to homeschool their children, after a state appeals court ruling severely restricted the practice in California.

"Every California child deserves a quality education and parents should have the right to decide what's best for their children," the governor said in a statement. "Parents should not be penalized for acting in the best interests of their children's education. This outrageous ruling must be overturned by the courts and if the courts don't protect parents' rights then, as elected officials, we will."

An estimated 166,000 children are homeschooled across the state.

The ruling by the Second District Court of Appeal in Los Angeles said all children ages 6 to 18 must attend public or private school full-time until graduation from high school or be tutored at home by a credentialed teacher.

The Southern California case stemmed from a child welfare dispute involving the children of Phillip and Mary Long of Lynwood (Los Angeles County). The couple's eight children have been home-schooled by Mary Long, who holds no teaching credential. The children were also enrolled in a private school through an independent study program, which included quarterly home visits. Although the case did not involve the question of the children's truancy, the court decision broadly addressed the legality of homeschooling in California while specifically ruling that the Long family's situation violated state law.

[TigersEye]

Were you home schooled? Is that the source of our bitterness?

[GVnana]

Holy Moly. This thread has had 6,000 views.

[firebrand]

Or someone reads it for him and excerpts. Methinks he did like the story about homeschoolers swarming over the statehouse. If he is smart, which he is, he will get this law changed.

[firebrand]

That should have been did NOT like.

[giobruno]

I graduated at summa cum laude with a double major from a good, state university, and, upon graduation, I enrolled in a teacher certification program. I lasted 2 weeks. It was the most worthless, insulting, waste of time and money I ever entered into. No one learns anything of value in teacher certification programs; they are state sponsored scams to enrich the universities and discourage anyone of talent or ability from ever entering into a public school.

If anyone wants a cold-eyed critique of the teacher accreditation scam, I recommend the books of Richard Mitchell; he'll set you straight on the subject.

[giobruno]

The judge refers to a 1961 statute (and I knew right away that it was a old statute from archaic language, using words like “patriotism”), but not a public school in California that I know of, from the administrators on down, would refer to their mission in that language, no one. He claims that is the mission of publics schools, but if you carved it over the mantle on every public school in CA, 400 groups would sue to have it removed at warmongering, racist, eurocentric, and culturally insensitive. Sorry, the state schools may create robots, but not those kind of robots who are good citizens who openly express love of country.

[the lastbestlady]

When homeschooling is outlawed, only outlaws will homeschool.

[P-Marlowe]

I think it might come down to the fact that if suddenly 166,000 homeschooled kids suddenly enrolled in public school the state would immediately go bankrupt.

166,000 children at an average cost of $8000 per year would cost the state 1.3 billion dollars per year.

[Texas4ever]

There would not be a probem if they would simply say...

WE HOMESCHOOL TO GET OUT OF G.W.BUSH’S NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND.... then there would be a celebration for those that homeschool.

[the lastbestlady]

No child left behind is pretty stupid. (in the sense of ‘you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear’)

[Texas4ever]

I started homeschooling my daughter this year, I was scared and felt I wouldn't know what to do.....

This has been the best year for me and my child. There are so many options to homeschooling. You really guide your child, you can do satelite programs, DVD, web-site with tutoring on-line, we do a co-op where there are teachers who decided to teach their children and take in several others.

My daughter has three classes twice a week with 15 other kids in them, all home schooled. (Geometry,Us History,Biology w.lab) Homework is done at home.

The other days she does literature, devotion, essay writing, debate and now studying the elections. I would say she has grown more in the last 5 months than her entire year at school.

[Texas4ever]

I was being sarcastic. I am just saying if they said it was done to spite George Bush....they would approve.

[the lastbestlady]

I gathered that (albeit AFTER I hit post) LOL

[quiverfull]

“Yeah, I missed that memo about how I wasn’t entitled to an opinion”

humblegunner, humblegunner..... you should of come out of the box by now! Yes...sigh...you can have an opinion, but remember, we need to base our opinions on something tangible...like facts.
There was this time in history when everyone believed the world was flat. Now, since we know the world is round, we don’t have to debate this anymore! See how that works? Same thing with your opinions. Once someone showing you facts and logic prove your opinions to be bogus, (1)you can say “yea-that does makes sense”, or, (2)you can be like the robin in the spring that keeps pecking the window. Don’t be the robin!

[wintertime]

166,000 children at an average cost of $8000 per year would cost the state 1.3 billion dollars per year.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

166,000 homeschoolers is likely a gross under count. It is probably more than twice that number.

Also, it likely costs twice the actual stated amount to educate a government schooled child.

If California is like my state, they conveniently leave out the bonds to built mulit-million dollar schools. Teachers pensions and retire health benefits are not included because once they are retired they simple leave the government school expense rolls and move over to the “retired government employees” column. Also, the schools in my state use many county and state services for no-charge that private schools must pay cash for. What an accounting racket!

So,...It isn't 1.3 billion. It is more like $5.2 BILLION! That's my guess!

[wintertime]

Teachers pensions and retire health benefits are not included because once they are retired they simple leave the government school expense rolls and move over to the “retired government employees” column.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

That should read: “retirement and health” benefits; “simply “

( I really should take more care with proof reading.)

[rfp1234]

"We're happy," said Lloyd Porter, who is on the California Teachers Association board of directors. "We always think students should be taught by credentialed teachers, no matter what the setting."

Riiiiight....then I propose that school board members should only be elected by credentialed VOTERS, i.e. those who can graduate from a training curriculum on United States History and Constitution.

[Sbmt2no1]

Any Waldorf Home schooling programs going on? I don’t live in Cali anymore but I do have a 7th grader. Go Arnie!

[CindyDawg]

I home schooled my youngest. I reviewed his lessons before I taught them. If I "got stumped" on something which occasionally happened with math problems, I resourced and figured it out. I didn't hide this from my son either. I taught him how to find answers. I have a college degree in science but I believe I could have done this without it. There are many talented, caring teachers in the public school system but they were not able to teach my child. It wasn't easy but I could.

That said, parents know best. Yeah, there may be some that let their kids run wild under the disguise of home schooling but this happens in public school too. I think you will find that most home schooling parents take the responsibility very seriously and if anything we "over teach" them:')

[Lancey Howard]

So, on the verge of caving to the rats and reluctantly (ha ha) agreeing to tax hikes (mainly to hand out more money to the education mafia), Arnold tries to give himself cover with Republicans by howling about homeschooling and some goofball judge’s ruling? Arnold’s lame politicking is so transparent it’s embarrassing.