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FreeRepublic , LLC PO BOX 9771 FRESNO, CA 93794
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Posted on 10/07/2002 4:30:04 AM PDT by chance33_98
State, home-school advocates spar
By Abbie Dutcher Record Staff Writer Published Monday, October 7, 2002
Yasmin McKemey made a decision four years ago that an increasingly large number of California parents make: She took her kids out of public school, deciding she would teach them herself at home.
A major reason, she says: Public schools have too many distractions.
It's ironic, in that sense, that home schooling itself in recent weeks has become a subject of much confusion.
The California Department of Education announced new procedures in July for enrolling home schoolers, requiring those who get home school affidavits to do so through the state instead of the county.
The seemingly harmless shift was not overlooked by home school advocates. They charge the state is engaged in a campaign to root out home schooling in California.
The state, they say, will enforce part of California's Education Code that requires those who receive affidavits either to have teacher credentials, to hire credentialed tutors or to enroll their children through accredited home school programs.
It has ignited a hot debate and has left the state's education chief and others looking for answers.
It has also left some parents such as McKemey on the sidelines of the debate waiting to see what happens.
Education confusion
The Education Department contends a parent without a teaching credential who files a private school affidavit is not exempt from the state's compulsory education law. That law says all children ages 6 to 18 must attend public school full time and requires their parents or guardians to send them to school. The only exemptions are for parents who hire tutors with the proper credentials to teach their children at home; enroll their children in full-time private schools; or enroll them in independent-study or home-study charter schools.
Many home-schooled children aren't covered: those whose uncredentialed parents simply got affidavits through any of the state's 58 county offices of education.
The HomeSchool Association of California and other home-schooling advocates believe otherwise.
The law allows anyone to establish a private school in his or her home for any number of students, provided the requirements are followed and the necessary affidavits filed, they say. Parents don't need California teaching credentials nor do they have to maintain a minimum enrollment to form a private school to home-school their children, according to Debbie Schwarzer of the HomeSchool Association's legal committee.
State Superintendent of Public Instruction Delaine Eastin sent a letter to state lawmakers Aug. 27, asking them to clarify the Department of Education's reading of the law.
"If home schools are to be authorized in California, that change needs to be made clear in the law," Eastin wrote. "If there are conditions that ought to be placed upon the quality of education being offered in a home school, then that should be made clear as well."
Eileen Gray, deputy general counsel for the state Department of Education, said the state's first goal is to get the law clarified. "It's a tough issue. All we can do right now is put our view of the law out there," she said.
In the meantime, school districts are still responsible for enforcing truancy laws, but how they go about doing that is up to them, she said.
Rule not enforced
County-level school officials, who until this summer issued affidavits to parents and other private school operators, say they monitor student attendance and have truancy programs in place. But they have rarely acted on the Education Code's credentialling requirement.
"I don't know of anyone in this county who has tried to go after a parent with a private school affidavit," said Mick Founts, associate superintendent of the San Joaquin County Office of Education's county-operated schools and programs, including the one in which the McKemeys participate.
That's not to say the county is unaware of the state's position.
"It was and probably still is the perception that if you get a private school affidavit, you are a school," Founts said. "But that isn't the case. It's a record-keeping device."
Manteca Unified School District Superintendent John Rieckewald said his district works with police officers and sheriff's deputies to enforce truancy laws. But the district has not yet looked into home schooling.
"We don't have the staff or the funding, and it really hasn't been an issue here," he said.
As Rebecca Frame, director of curriculum and student services in Tracy Unified School District, put it: "So much is up in the air. This is a new interpretation. So we'll just wait and see what pans out."
Who's affected?
Thousands of home schoolers could be impacted in the state, some observers say. The state Education Department says it doesn't keep count of the number of home-schooled children, because home schooling is not recognized as an alternative to public school.
In San Joaquin County, it could be hundreds.
The children are taught mostly by uncredentialed parents who do not have credentialed tutors coming to their homes and who have not enrolled their children in home school programs licensed by the state.
Last year, the San Joaquin County Office of Education received 249 applications for affidavits, which were forwarded to the state, said Sandra Budesa, who oversaw the affidavit filings for the county for years.
Of those, 196 were for schools of six or fewer students.
McKemey enrolled her son Nick, a high school freshman, and daughter Megan, a seventh-grader, though a program at the San Joaquin County Office of Education. The independent-study charter school program enrolls about 480 students countywide.
So she and her children are not affected by the debate swirling around home schooling.
But she has not ignored the feud.
"I know there are some abuses," she said of home schooling, "but the majority of parents who home school are very dedicated to the goal of educating their children."
Good place for a quote.... Adolph Hitler said….”Let me control the textbooks and I will control the state. The state will take youth and give to youth it’s own education and it’s own upbringing. Your child belongs to us already….what are you?”
Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit The Palace Of Reason: http://palaceofreason.com
If Hitler had said half the things he's credited with, he wouldn't have had time to create so much mischief. Can you cite a primary source for this?
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FreeRepublic , LLC PO BOX 9771 FRESNO, CA 93794
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They certainly kept Babs busy with her Shakespere. Caveat emptor.
It has been amazing in Texas to watch the number of children winning honors for academic achievement overall, leading tehir classes, winning spelling and math competitions - you name it - all from home schooled programs. My sister in law home-schools her kids in Indiana and after seeing the results, wish that my wife and I did not try the same.
If the public schools were only focused on teaching, we would all be better off. Unfortunately, this is also about power and money - and the public schools want it all.
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