Washington, D.C. has finally adopted its new homeschool regulations, which includes a requirement for a high school diploma (or equivalent) for homeschooling parents, 15 days written notice prior to removing a child from public school and portfolio available for review up to twice per year by state board officials.
What exactly a “thorough, regular education” is according to state board officials, I am not sure, but if it looks anything like what the D.C. public schools are providing, homeschools probably have little to worry about. Too many people think that homeschooling by default means a lack of a “thorough, regular education,” but hopefully state board officials will not be so blinded by stereotypes.
These new restrictions were of course prompted, or at least accelerated, by the murders of four children at the hands of Banita Jacks who claimed to homeschool her children. When the decaying bodies of the children were finally discovered, they hadn’t been seen for months. As horrific as this situation was, does anyone really believe that having a portfolio on file would have changed anything? Perhaps (perhaps) the children would have been discovered sooner. But the funny thing about laws is that generally law-abiding citizens are the ones respecting them.
This case highlighted a number of weaknesses in D.C.’s social services system which had nothing to do with Jacks’ claim to be homeschooling. Social services had been looking for her for some time, closing cases because she didn’t answer the door when they knocked. This case revealed an overburdened system that cannot handle the number of reports it is already receiving. Will adding to this the oversight of thousands of people with no charges or allegations brought against them really improve the situation? Or will yet more children be lost in a system too overworked to effectively follow-up on existing allegations?
And then came this little gem, which I honestly wasn’t sure how to take.
The role of D.C. government in home-schooling attracted attention from across the country. The state board had two public meetings and received more than 2,800 e-mails and written comments, as well as 400 phone calls. Approximately 16 written comments came from D.C. residents. Washington Post
My initial bemused reaction had a lot to do with something I skimmed and misunderstood only minutes before reading the article. See, HSLDA sent out an e-lert to members in Ohio about the state’s five year review of its homeschool law, an e-lert many found too alarmist and misleading regarding what the review is actually about. The Columbus-Dispatch also had a brief blog entry on the topic by their “E-Team,” a group of education writers. In my browser tab, the entry came up as “Homeschoolers on Alert (The E-Team)” and I at first thought it referred to HSLDA and its e-lerts. I found it an amusing picture, and not an entirely inaccurate illustration of homeschool networking.
Like The A-Team, but via e-mail.
Unfortunately, I don’t really like the way The Washington Post described the feedback generated by the proposals. At first reading, it appears that 16 of 2,800 comment originated from D.C. residents, implying that the vast homeschool networking monster is meddling in the city’s affairs. I’m sure politicians love wading through the outraged protests of citizens who will never be voting for them because they do not even reside in the same state, let alone district. It also would imply that D.C. homeschoolers were decidedly apathetic to the whole process, which their high levels of attendance would tend to contradict.
But we really do not know how many of those 2,800 comments were written. Sixteen? Eighteen? One hundred? It would be interesting to know.
At any rate, I do appreciate the homeschool “E-Team,” those impassioned homeschoolers who monitor what is going on in their states and in the media and alerting those in their networks. I am sure it has staved off quite a number of intrusions into the liberties of homeschoolers.
And I just found out that the first two seasons of the A-Team are available on Hulu.com. Please tell me I’m not the only one who grew up on this sort of television.
homeschool homeschooling home education Banita Jacks Washington D.C.
Principled Discovery is a place to stop and discuss news and information related to faith, family and particularly education. Pour yourself a cup of tea and join the conversation! 
Is it wrong of me to think that people who don’t like the state meddling in their affairs are NOT going to send a letter with their NAME and address attached to officials stating that they homeschool and why they’re against this legislation? It’s rather a silly point, charting how many locals responded.
I, too, think some of the e-alerts are a little panicked. I appreciate that someone is looking out for homeschooling, though, and can ignore the ones I think have nothing to do with homeschool freedoms.
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I haven’t commented in a long time, and the A-Team is what’s got me commenting, lol! You are not the only one. My boys love watching all the old shows on Netflix instant download and the networks that have their classics online.
As for E-lerts. On one hand, I do appreciate them. They keep us on our toes and informed. On the other hand, it really irritates me when people don’t really educate themselves on the issues and Fwd-fwd-fwd them ad nauseum and cause a huge ruckus among the even more uneducated and naive. I have one young woman who calls me, for fear that Here in TEXAS, land of the free, they are going to come take her kids away because it is against the law in Germany to home school.
DC politics don’t really have the reputation of being the most Constitutional, do they?
FWIW, we started homeschooling while we lived in DC, although the school officials wouldn’t have counted us in this pre-school year. The DC homeschooling regs were rather confusing, since it refered to a notification process to a board that had never been established.
I was quite pleased to see that articles about the new regs quoted representatives of DC homeschooling groups. When I lived there, the only group in the district I could find evidence of was on Bolling Air Force Base. However, it was mostly military and we were also mostly residents of other states, a hard position from which to lobby for homeschool liberties.
Yeah! I’m not the only one…I actually watched most of an episode last night…er…this morning while I was working on this entry. Then I looked at the clock.
You know, it surprised me that D.C. was so friendly to homeschooling to begin with. But one thing that seems to have come from this is greater organization among D.C. homeschoolers.
As to the E-Lerts, they do annoy me. Almost every one has some story about CPS and I can’t help but wonder how many of the contacts are actually legitimate and why HSLDA wants to use this as a promotion tool when homeschoolers already suffer from the stereotype of hiding their children for some insidious reason.
But the only real power homeschoolers have is in our ability to quickly let just about everyone know what is going on and in the fact that a large percentage of us are politically active and don’t mind writing and calling legislators and newspapers. With or without HSLDA, we make a pretty good E-Team.
FWIW, the new regs have led the DC Homeschoolers to organize themselves and more than just 16 DC homeschoolers were actively involved in the process. When news of the initial proposed regs (which were even more onerous…calling for school officials to actually observe instruction!) came out, many DC homeschoolers reached out to those of us in surrounding areas for advice (there is a lot of crossover as far as activities and groups in the metro area btw Virginia, DC and Maryland). Our statewide group, VaHomeschoolers, talked with some of the DC folks and also formally responded during the open comment period.
There is a new group DCHE (http://www.dchea.org/) that has formed. Before this, the DC homeschool community was not overly organized, with a few support groups mostly geared towards activities, not advocacy. The other thing to keep in mind is that the DC homeschool population is very small (I seem to recall reading somewhere about 100+ but don’t quote me). Which is another reason why this “crackdown” on homeschoolers is mostly of the “feel good” kind of legislation.
My biggest problem with the HSLDA e-lerts is that they tell you what to do (call etc), but do not provide any links directly to the legislation in question so you can make your own determination about whether something is as dire as they make out. They seem to expect you to trust them to do the thinking for you. No thanks. I prefer to rely on local homeschoolers who have a stake in the outcome for my information as well as better knowledge of the political climate.
As I have said before, HSLDA is in a win-win situation when it comes to putting out e-lerts. If nothing happens with the law, then they can trumpet that their call and all the “action” that their members took “worked” and isn’t it great that they are out there keeping an eye on things. If something does happen with the law, then they can trumpet…”see, homeschooling is under attack! You need us to protect you! Join us now”.
HSLDA has no personal stake in the outcome. It is business and about political power and they “win” either way. Unlike the local homeschoolers who have to live with the outcome and have much more at stake.
That’s great cooperation concerning the VA Homeschoolers’ involvement! What a great group.
Makes sense that there is a lot of cross involvement with VA and Maryland homeschoolers. Every time I got lost heading to a DC site, I ended up in Virginia or Maryland.
I also wish that the original legislation documentation (or link to such) was put in e-lerts and such by homeschool groups. If homeschoolers don’t have that direct access to the information, it makes it harder to determine the real problem(or not).
Many homeschoolers pride themselves on looking at original/primary sources in their history studies to stay away from potential revisionism. So it should go with homeschool advocacy.
I agree with you there, Stephanie. Although the last time I received an e-lert regarding Nebraska homeschooling, it did contain a link to legislation. Something going on in Virginia which was fully irrelevant. Obviously a mistake, but there was an attempt there.
Honestly, I’d pay more attention to them if they just contained neutral summaries, links and contact information. And if the “look what HSLDA has done for so-and-so” was done at the end. I really don’t mind organizations promoting themselves. They have a tough time existing without some sort of promotion. Actually, of all the organizations on the Left and Right, Christian and otherwise, I have been involved with Voice of the Martyrs is the only one that doesn’t annoy me in the way it requests funding and promotes its activities.
I for one wish hslda would lay off the e-lerts until they do more research. I wasn’t following the DC scene closely so I’m not clear on that, but I know they sure messed it up for some people in Missouri. Here, we have a state watchdog group that watches legislative actions and talks to the legislators before ringing the warning bell.
I agree LeeAnn. I would like more information and less “act now!” in their e-lerts. Just to be clear, my praise at the end for the “E-Team” wasn’t really meant in regards to HSLDA, but to all the homeschoolers active in Internet forums and blogs who post what is going on in their states and regions. It doesn’t take very long to know about what is going on in homeschooling because so many people are ready and willing to share that information with everyone they know.
I think that it’s important to realize that the time and place for citizens to provide input on issues is often way before they hit the press.
An example that I’m familiar with is a local teen curfew in the township where my in-laws live. Much of the comment was from the one trustee on the board who was pushing it. Only one trustee (out of three) opposed the curfew. The public pretty much ignored the topic. The nighttime curfew passed and within a few years, the township had also passed a daytime curfew.
The time to oppose the daytime curfew was years earlier, when it was a nightime curfew proposal. But there was no public outcry about labeling people as criminals because of there age/location rather than because of there actual actions. There was no demanding that the police chief provide statistics of how many crimes in the township involved youth. There was no effort to demonstrate the effectiveness of the night curfew before imposing a daytime curfew.
All of which is a long way around to saying that eternal vigilance and monitoring little committees and meetings helps to staunch the flow of bad resolutions and legislation.
(Full disclosure: my mother-in-law was the one trustee to vote against the nighttime curfew. The daytime curfew was passed after she was out of office.)
Seabastion, I’m right there with you about curfews, nighttime or daytime. They’ve been proven unconstitutional here and there in courts, but that seems to make little difference.
Good for your m-i-l!