On July 20th, I awoke at 6 am, stumbled out to the driveway,
collected my Dispatch, and, wiping the sleep from my eyes, read
Kristen Munson’s front-page article:
”
Homeschool on the rise.
”
There were several inaccuracies in the article, for none of
which is Ms. Munson to blame. Indeed, some of the inaccuracies will
seem mere quibbles, due entirely to world view differences. Let us
set those aside for now.
On July 20th, I awoke at 6 am, stumbled out to the driveway, collected my Dispatch, and, wiping the sleep from my eyes, read Kristen Munson’s front-page article: “Homeschool on the rise.”
There were several inaccuracies in the article, for none of which is Ms. Munson to blame. Indeed, some of the inaccuracies will seem mere quibbles, due entirely to world view differences. Let us set those aside for now.
More important inaccuracies were due to faulty information received by Ms. Munson. Specifically, GUSD’s Assistant Superintendent of Educational Services Jackie Horejs told her that “parents need to inform the district if they are going to homeschool their children.”
“It’s really just a notification with [GUSD’s Attendance Officer] Frank Valadez.” Horejs went on to admit, “But he doesn’t have the authority to approve or disapprove the affidavit.”
The article quoted California Department of Education public information officer Pam Slater as saying, “You can file a private school affidavit online with the CDE but you must file with the district, too. We do not have oversight of homeschooling … We have put the responsibility for homeschooling under the districts.”
After reading this, I did what any sensible, law-abiding homeschooler would do. I rolled my eyes, put the tea kettle on, and called my lawyer, Pat Ramirez of Home School Legal Defense Association. Pat and I have been on a first name basis ever since Frank Valadez wrote his first letter to the editor.
HSLDA is located in Virginia, so, thanks to the time difference, Pat was already at her desk. I read the paragraphs aloud to her. She laughed, promised to read the entire article when it came online in the afternoon, and told me to enjoy my tea.
HSLDA promptly called CDE’s legal counsel, wrote a letter to the editor, and sent out an E-Lert to California members. The E-lert says, in part:
“We contacted the legal counsel at the CDE that supervises the private school sector and he assured us that [filing with the district] is not a new requirement of the CDE and there must have been a misunderstanding between the reporter and Pam Slater.”
Back in the old days, before the Internet, in 2001 and before, to be precise, I used to call the private school liaison at the County of Education, and leave a voicemail message with my address. The liaison, Bonnie, would mail me a blank R-4, which I filled out with a ballpoint pen, bearing down heavily so that all four flimsy copies would be legible.
I would keep the one marked “Private School'” and mail the state, county, and district copies back to her. I imagine she sent the appropriate copies to the state and to the district; that was her job.
Nowadays, we file our R-4’s online. I imagine the CDE notifies the districts, or the districts can request the information from the CDE. That is their job. We are not required to notify the district.
GUSD has displayed good sense recently, so I believe they will drop this harassment of homeschoolers, and dedicate their time and energy to pursuing truants and educating the children entrusted to them.
Another inaccuracy in the article was my fault; I told Ms. Munson that the district has a public independent studies program for high school students. And so there is, but I have since learned from one homeschooling mother of four that she tried to enroll her teen in the program and was not allowed to do so. Apparently the ISP is only for GUSD students who want to partially leave the high school, not for homeschoolers who want to partially join.
Back to the quibbles: the article begins, “There are about 1.1 million children in the United States who… are privately enrolled in homeschool programs that teach to state standards and outside the public school curriculum.”
State laws vary so widely that this sentence is nonsense. Not all the 1.1 million children are enrolled in any program. Not all programs are private; some are public. Some teach to state standards. Some use public school curriculum.
In short, the sentence seems logical enough to anyone raised in a monolithic public school system, but the reality is considerably more diverse and interesting.
