As more information is coming out about the Banita Jacks case, in which the bodies of four children were found decomposing in their bedrooms, “homeschooling” has taken center stage. Acknowledging the missteps of government agencies who had multiple contacts with the family and closed the case against agency procedures, mayor Adrian Fenty has turned his attention to better tracking methods.
He also vowed to establish a system to track children who are home-schooled or who move from school to school. After Jacks’s daughters were withdrawn from D.C. charter schools, she sent word through a school employee that she would home-school the girls. Washington Post
Why not focus on the admittedly faulty system which had more than one report of concern for the children’s welfare? Did this family “fall through the cracks” because they were not in public school? Or because CPS workers closed her case without doing the necessary follow up? Maybe something could have helped, Maybe not.
Honestly, the way in which this woman pulled her children does arouse suspicion. The girls simply stopped attending school. It wasn’t until school officials checked up on the truant children that the mother informed them she would be homeschooling. In Washington, DC, notification is not required unless you are removing your child from a public school.
So she was in violation of the law.
Maybe that shouldn’t be enough to arouse suspicions, but that does seem to be a familiar pattern emerging from these cases. “Homeschooling” is used as a front to escape consequences from a problem that has already developed. Here it was extended truancy. In Texas, there were multiple reports made to CPS against the Ramirez family before they eventually pulled little Crystal to allegedly homeschool. And starved her to death.
These are waters into which one must tread very cautiously, but truancy is already associated with child abuse. Should the parents of truant children be able to simply say, “Oh yeah, we’re homeschooling,” and remove themselves and their children of all consequences?
And while this is fully irrelevant to this particular case, what of the growing trend to push problem children out of school? In an article shared by Susan of Corn and Oil, we learn of parents who are being told by school officials that they have to homeschool because of grades or chronic truancy. Corn and Oil has been following the pushout trend for awhile and has a lot more information on her blog.
Parents of current and former Mooresville High School students have raised complaints about the way students are being dismissed from school, and parents are being told they have to home- school their children. Reporter Times
No Child Left Behind is putting incredible pressure on school districts to improve their statistics. “Homeschooled” looks better on paper than “dropped out.” And when public schools are allowed to push all their problems out of the system, forcing families to homeschool, are we going to blame the institution of homeschooling when something goes wrong?
Update: In case you haven’t seen it, the New York Times makes this case all about homeschooling, as opposed to simply mentioning homeschooling.Venomous Kate responds with the best piece of writing on this whole mess I have seen yet.
I cannot help but ask one question. After an entire article about the evident need for better “watchdogs” to police the homeschooling community, the New York Times closes with this:
Washington still has no formal regulations, according to spokesmen for both the mayor and the public school system, although parents are supposed to file an “intent to withdraw from school” form with the district, something that did not happen in the Jacks case, although school social workers made several attempts to visit the family and reported the childrens’ absence from school to authorities. NYT
In other words, the children weren’t being homeschooled even by D.C.’s lenient regulations. They were chronically truant and the mother said she was homeschooling. No one followed up regarding her lack of paperwork, nor any of the other complaints about the family’s welfare. Perhaps we need to look at improving existing procedures before further taxing a system that obviously cannot handle monitoring even those who have raised flags?
Hat Tip: Rational Jenn
Crimson Wife shares some more thoughts on the Jacks’ case.
As does Homeschool and Etc.
[tags]homeschool, homeschooling, Banita Jacks, pushouts[/tags]
These are waters into which one must tread very cautiously
Isn’t that the truth. I need to run and pick up kids (being socialized, ya know):-), but wanted to point out an article(s) from a situation with your neighbors to the east and mine to the west, Dana. I wonder if you hadn’t blogged about this at some point, but Sarah and Lynn Leslie wrote this in 2004 and Sarah was interviewed in Home Ed Mag:
http://www.homeedmag.com/groups/2004/1004.html
Food for thought
In regards to the “forced” out students, let’s not forget that if a family “homeschools” through the District, the District still gets funds for that student being enrolled and yet test scores are part of the homeschooling category.
Dana, you should seriously submit your post as a Letter to the Editor of the DC papers in the area that these stories took place. People need to think before they jump on the homeschooling-is-a-front/cover bandwagon…which tends to spread like wildfire.
Sorry, I wanted to make sure the article title was listed as it says a lot:
“Homeschooling Under Fire: The Iowa Homeschooling Crisis of 1989-90 A history of the plot to depict homeschoolers as truants and child abusers” By Lynn and Sarah Leslie, August 30, 2004
http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/04/homeschooling_under_fire.htm
No, Susan. I hadn’t blogged on that…that was going on just as I was beginning to homeschool and I was probably one of the ones who stuck my fingers in my ears. Or maybe not…I don’t know. All of my concerns regarding education reform were based solely on my experience as a public school teacher.
Why the continued push for legislation which affects so many innocent people rather than focusing on what the real problems are?
Thank you for the links, Susan. They add a lot to think about.
Thank you, Shawna. It is so easy to look at homeschooling and think something evil is going on…fear is generally based in ignorance. They don’t stop to think whether they want to give the state the power to monitor homes based on these labels.
Some of the biggest “flags” for abuse are enrollment in assistance programs, use of multiple childcare options (school, after school, daycare, etc.) and single moms. No one advocates checking up on people in these groups (nor do I), although there is an actual statistical connection between abuse rates and these factors.
There is no statistical connection between homeschooling and abuse. Only a handful of anecdotes.
This is exactly the argument that my relatives, here in Texas, use to say to that we need to be looked after.
But…as my dh points out to them every time…this is not a problem with homeschool laws. This is a problem with enforcing existting laws and a broken cps system.
Just comparing and contrasting these last two cases should be proof enough.
In one case, a boy was forcibly taken by SWAT from his home on the word of CPS workers. In the other case, FOUR children died because a CPS worker did not do their job thoroughly.
It’s broken, don’t create laws where none need to be, enforce the ones that exist and find out what was wrong in the system.
We are keeping a close eye on this here in Virginia. VaHomeschoolers has moved their statement on homeschooling and child abuse to their homepage:
Child Abuse and Homeschooling: No Connection
http://www.vahomeschoolers.org/issues/child_abuse.asp
I hope to have time to blog about this soon…
Thank you, Stephanie. If you blog on it, feel free to stop by and leave the link! We’re still battling a bit of family illness so I’m not keeping up with blog reading as much as I normally do.
Christy, you are very right. When things go wrong, we look for someone to blame. We don’t stop to ask what existing laws and services were not being utilized properly. And we forget that if we want any degree of liberty whatsoever, there will always be some chance of bad things happening.
So far, in the cases I know of, however, there have been flags before the family even began homeschooling.
So, if one politician takes a bribe, does that warrant wire-tapping all phone conversations involving politicians?
You know, we really need to keep better track of these so-called “politicians.” How can we trust them to do what their supposed to be doing?
Just a thought.
We can construct an entire bureaucracy to monitor the bureaucracy!
Some stats:
In 2005:
3.6 million children received CPS investigations or assessments.
899,000 children were victims of maltreatment; 12.1 per 1,000 children
That is a lot of false reporting!
More:
73.1% of neglected children are from birth to 3 years.
86.6% child abuse stems from neglect by a parent.
40.4% of child were maltreated by mothers acting alone
Rates of victimization by race:
19.5% African-American, 16.5%, American Indian or Alaska Native, and 16.1% Pacific Islander children have the highest rates of victimization.
So does that mean that all African-American women with children aged birth to three years should just hand their children over to the state? Almost 20%!
But of course, we look at that and do not see a racial problem. We see it for what it is: a social problem. A problem caused by poverty, drug abuse, broken homes, families in crisis. And although there is a strong statistical correlation, no one in their right mind says, “Let’s track all black children!” It would be absurd to think that.
There is not even a statistical correlation between homeschooling and abuse. Just the imaginations of journalists and politicians who cannot imagine any other reason to homeschool but to hide abuse.
Oops, forgot to link the source of all that:
http://www.karisable.com/crcabuse.htm
I didn’t check all the stats, but the ones I did looked accurate.
Some of the biggest “flags” for abuse are enrollment in assistance programs, use of multiple childcare options (school, after school, daycare, etc.) and single moms. No one advocates checking up on people in these groups (nor do I), although there is an actual statistical connection between abuse rates and these factors.
It’s interesting. At a Fee-For-Service Initiatives Committee (sigh)hearing in Springfield, I listened to the Dept of Public Aid spokesperson mention that all Illinois children that are in the Medicaid and DCFS systems are now screened for ‘mental health’(TeenScreen). That is also why the same children are too often in near zombie state with off-label drugs.
I was reading the emotional abuse flags on the site you noted. I’ve seen or heard of every one of these done in the classrooms. Let alone children made to wet their pants, et al. Where do we go from here other than banging away at the back to the basic government drum? Meanwhile and so sadly, children fall through the bureaucratic cracks and die.
From the Child Abuse Prevention site:
A parent/caregiver who continually uses any of the following when interacting or disciplining a child is emotionally abusing the child.
rejecting (e.g., saying “I wish you were
never born”)
criticizing (e.g., saying “Why can’t you
do anything right?”)
» insulting (e.g., saying “I can’t believe
you would be so stupid”)
» humiliating (e.g., embarrassing a child
in front of other people)
» isolating (e.g., not allowing a child to
play with friends)
» terrorizing (e.g., scaring a child by
saying “The police will come and take
you away”)
» corrupting (e.g., always swearing in
front of the child, or getting the child to
participate in things against the law)
» not responding emotionally
» punishing a child for exploring the
environment
You are right, Susan. I started to comment earlier, but I think it shall be a post if I can track down the original report rather than just the excerpted citation. Interesting stuff.
Some of the statements are contradictory, however. This was my favorite:
Research shows that child abuse can be prevented. Cruelty to children is the willful infliction of pain and suffering through physical, sexual, or emotional mistreatment including incest and other sexual molestation or rape, prostitution or pornography, unjustifiable verbal abuse; failure to furnish proper shelter, nourishment, medical treatment, or emotional support,The need to increase prevention is urgent and global.
Followed immediately by:
The CPS system has not been successful in stopping the repeat maltreatment, neglect, abuse and victimization.
So it can be prevented, but we haven’t figured out how, yet? Am I reading that right? We are going to institute global solutions to a problem we have not even figured out how to solve locally?
We are never going to be able to prevent evil, but we can use swift and sure punishment to deter those who contemplate it, and remove those who can’t be deterred from society.
The reason so many bad guys are out there being bad is that the system hands out so many “Get out of jail free” cards to scumbags who victimize the most vulnerable in our society. Fry ‘em! :p
Thank you for the link, Dana.
You know, I can’t help wondering if Banita Jacks’ mental deterioration was triggered by the death of the girls’ father, Nathan Fogel. Granted, Fogel’s mother described her as somewhat limited in coping skills when Fogel was in the hospital, and maybe she was having a hard time coming to terms with his eventual death due to leukemia.
It seems like her life swiftly took a turn for the worse around that time.
What bothers me is that nurses suspected she abused substances and phoned in a report. The Child Service Agency, which had “assumed the family moved” in June 2007 should have linked that report to her and realized she was still in town.
Had they done so perhaps we would not be writing about these girls’ deaths.
Kind of makes a person wonder whether D.C.’s social services is even computerized, doesn’t it?
On another note: that final paragraph of the NY Times that you quoted should never have made it past an editor. Gah!
That one run-on sentence reveals SO much about the reporter’s journalistic abilities.
Kate, the article was poorly written all the way around! I generally like the NYT, except when they are talking about homeschooling, because their writing is generally decent. But this was full of disjointed thoughts…it was hard to read from a stylistic point alone.
But as I’ve heard before, unclear thinking leads to unclear writing. : )
I had the same thoughts, too. I don’t know that anything would have necessarily changed…as someone in another discussion (on your blog?) pointed out, mental illness is a hard one to force. But she did have contact with the state, moreso than most of us. And she still slipped through. Apparently because they were in too big of a hurry to get their cases closed.
And that is something else I’d like to look into. Here in NE, we were fined a bunch of money for not meeting federal standards in our foster system. That lead to a huge push to close cases. That looks good on paper, but isn’t always best for the child.