Should Home-Schooling Be Illegal?

Parade magazine has a poll asking if teaching credentials should be a requirement for homeschooling. At the moment 93% say NO. Click here to vote.

Educational anarchy

Teachers Union Attacks Homeschoolers - PJI Responds



The California Teachers Association claims in its brief that allowing parents to homeschool their children without requiring a teaching credential will result in "educational anarchy."



What exactly is "educational anarchy"?

Dictionary.com doesn't have an entry for educational anarchy. But this is the definition for educational;
ed·u·ca·tion·al
Audio Help Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[ej-oo-key-shuh-nl] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–adjective
1.
pertaining to education.
2.
tending or intended to educate, instruct, or inform: an educational show on television.
and this entry for anarchy
anarchy 1 [ˈӕnəki] noun
the absence or failure of government

So educational anarchy would be the absence of government in instructing students. Sounds pretty good to me. I suppose the California Teachers Association thought that using the word anarchy which has negative connotations for a lot of people would lead most people to assume that educational anarchy was something bad.

On the other side of the ledger, a brief filed by Governor Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Jerry Brown recognizes "that home schooling has a long and positive history in California and across the nation."

Brad Dacus, president of Pacific Justice Institute, commented on the recent developments as follows: "Contrary to the outrageous position of the California Teachers Association, homeschooling is not educational anarchy - it is educational opportunity. We are pleased that the Governor and many other influential voices are weighing in on this important debate, and we look forward to presenting the Court with the best possible defense of both homeschoolers and independent-study private schools."

Teacher, student get into brawl at Ga. school

Police say the 52-year-old Jones kicked the student, which prompted the fight.

Now here is a good reason for Homeschoolers to write letters

Five people in Tennessee, who hold homeschool diplomas, have recently been deemed unqualified for certain positions of employment because of their homeschooling. Since last year, the Tennessee Department of Education has begun withholding approval of such diplomas, but Representative Mile Bell has been fighting to gain back the recognition these diplomas previously enjoyed.

Bell told LifeSiteNews.com that until last year, no person in Tennessee had ever had an issue with an employer for holding a category IV diploma - the official title of diplomas issued to private church-related students, including homeschooled students.

Recently, however, employers that are required by statute to hire only those persons with a high school diploma, including the police department, day-care workers and education workers, have either suspended or denied employment to five category IV diploma holders.

After graduating with a 4.0 average from a police academy, one Rockwood police officer lost his certification, possibly deeming all of his arrests invalid, "because the DOE refused to recognize his category IV diploma." Bell also mentioned that this occurred seven years after the officer received his category IV high school diploma.

Who Needs Subway

Certainly not homeschoolers who were EXCLUDED from their contest, Hey Subway: What's the Deal? . Homeschoolers have their very own contest at Silly Sandwiches. So drop by and submit your story and while you are at it why not enjoy a sandwich from a locally owned sandwich shop or visit a farmers market and make your own sandwich using fresh produce.

HT: Natalie

School board defines home-schooler terms

When is a homeschooler not a homeschooler?

The Mineral County Board of Education settled on 50 percent as the proposed in-school, class-load threshold to consider a home-school student a full-time public school student.

Under the proposed policy, any home school students who take more than half of their coursework through the Mineral County school system will be considered full time and subject to all course requirements such as class pre-requisites.

H$LDA Takes Subway to Task

Now HSLDA is sending Subway letters.

In the News

The Subway debacle is now garnering media attention.
AC (Associated Content) ~ Homeschool Families Call for Boycott of Subway Restaurants
While homeschooled parents across the web cry for a boycott and a public apology from Subway we can only wait to see if the proposed boycott will make a difference, and whether or not Subway can recover from this disastrous PR debacle.

We Never Forget by Linda Dobson

In the May- June 2008 Issue of Home Education Magazine, Linda Dobson has written a heartfelt article, We Never Forget. She writes about a recent gathering where the topic of discussion was school horror stories. She writes: Forty-even fifty years later- and we can recount school-related humiliation as if it happened yesterday. We haven’t forgotten.

Subscribe to HEM to read the full article.

Is this what they mean by socialization?

By Colleen Wixon (Contact)

Originally published 01:50 p.m., May 23, 2008

TCPALM

My heart bleeds for this poor little boy.

Melissa Barton said she is considering legal action after her son's kindergarten teacher led his classmates to vote him out of class.

After each classmate was allowed to say what they didn't like about Barton's 5-year-old son, Alex, his Morningside Elementary teacher said they were going to take a vote, Barton said.

By a 14 to 2 margin, the class voted him out of the class.

Barton said her son is in the process of being diagnosed with Aspberger's, a type of high-functioning autism. Alex began the testing process in February for an official diagnosis under the suggestion of Morningside Principal Marsha Cully.

Not only did this emotionally abusive teacher damage this poor child emotionally she also damaged his classmates. Surely some of them at least understood what they were doing was wrong and felt bad about it.

They said he was "disgusting" and "annoying," Barton said.

"He was incredibly upset," Barton said. "The only friend he has ever made in his life was forced to do this."

HT: The RedMolly Picayune-Democrat

Ragamuffin Studies: But Is It Education?

Ragamuffin Studies: But Is It Education?

A Great Reason to Homeschool

So – in a perfect little nutshell – here is my reason (right at this moment) for wanting to homeschool our kids: I want them to know who they are. I want to help them find their own path, and then I want to walk with them just a little bit of the way. And ultimately, of course, I want to set them free.

From Why Homeschooling? by Pam Dolan.

Identity and power in the homeschool “movement”

Drop by Principled Discovery to read Identity and power in the homeschool “movement”

Dr Laura on Homeschooling

Research examining home-schooled students’ academic achievements have consistently found that they score higher than the national norms on standard achievement tests. So the only grenade left to throw at home-schooling parents is that they are hurting their children socially and emotionally. The few studies in these areas have generally found home-schooled children to have equal or better self-esteem than traditionally schooled students. Then the argument becomes one of how to truly know you are measuring self-esteem.

Short Sighted

I think the decision to ban homeschoolers from the Subway/Scholastic Writing Contest, was short sighted. In the event a homeschooler won the athletic equipment could have been donated to a community playground, recreational sports league or church of the homeschoolers choice.

Kim's Play Place: Homeschool Vs. Public School: A Vignette

Kim's Play Place: Homeschool Vs. Public School: A Vignette

Historian Wants People to Remember Memorial Day's Beginnings

It's a Southern thing.

A Purdue University historian says credit really belongs to thousands of Southern white women.

"If Confederate men would have organized memorials to honor their fallen soldiers in 1866, a year after the Civil War ended, it would have been considered treason against the United States," says Caroline Janney, an assistant professor of history. "Instead, women organized each event, and the men were figuratively hiding behind the skirts of these women. The memorial celebrations served as shields so that participants could simultaneously criticize the postwar government and praise their 'Lost Cause.' What many people don't realize is that these women, who are often portrayed as politically indifferent, were motivated by politics, too."

The women, through Ladies' Memorial Associations, organized dozens of memorials during the spring of 1866 and the years after. While Memorial Day is now a one-day celebration, historically these memorials were scheduled throughout the spring as a sign of renewal and rebirth, and each community chose its own symbolic date on which to gather. For example, some selected the May 10 anniversary of Gen. Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson's death while others settled on April 26, the day Gen. Joseph E. Johnston surrendered his troops in 1865.

Read the rest here.

Carnival of Homeschooling

Drop by Po Moyemu ~ In my Opinion to read the 125th Carnival of Homeschooling.

Teacher advocates violence

In today's Soundoff
Those little angels

• To all you angry bus drivers: After the kids get done with you in the morning they come to us, the teachers, and continue the abuse. I have never seen anything like it. I have been kicked in the leg, punched in the stomach, and do you know what the parents' response is? Someone must have provoked him/her to do that. Parents don't want to take responsibility for their children's actions. This new breed of "no discipline" parenting has got to go. Parents, get off your behinds and do your job. Stop being lazy. You need your tail torn up by someone for not tearing up your child's behind. It doesn't take a genius to figure this out. Unless you want to visit your child in jail, parents, you better do your job and stop thinking your child is a little angel.

Who needs real science when a myth will do

A remarkable new genetic study published last week has demonstrated that the closest living relative of the giant T. rex are birds — specifically, chickens and ostriches — rather than reptiles like alligators and lizards.

Friday's study also creates some problems for political activists who continue their assault on the teaching of Darwinian evolution in public schools. Actor and game show host Ben Stein was in Missouri this month to promote a new film that questions evolution.

Apparently expecting public schools to teach 'real science' and not theology as science is asking too much.

Once again this year, a bill has been introduced in the Legislature that would encourage students to question evolution. House Bill 2554, sponsored by Rep. Robert Wayne Cooper, R-Camdenton, claims to support academic freedom for teachers, and to help students "develop critical thinking skills." Those are the latest fig leaves used by creationists in their long war against science and evolution.

The war is being waged in legislatures and movie theaters because it cannot be waged in the pages of scientific journals. Adherents of so-called intelligent design criticize what they call gaps in the evolutionary record, but offer no scientific alternative to explain the evidence. Indeed, they have tried to redefine the very nature of science to accommodate their preferred conclusion.

If you want to give a creationist heartburn just ask them about Genesis Chapter 6, Verses 1-4 (King James)

And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them. That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose. And the Lord said My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.

Since the creationist whole argument is based on the belief that we MUST take the biblical account of creation as TRUTH then why don't they insist that everything in the bible is TRUE. It's in the BIBLE that GOD had many sons and that they took human women for wives, therefore it must be true following the creationist logic. The fact that it sounds a bit like the Greek myths (Zeus was forever sleeping with some poor human girl that his wife Hera then 'punished' for catching her husbands eye.), is irrelevant it's in the Bible. And never mind that it contradicts the new testaments claim that Jesus is God's only begotten son, I am sure the creationist can find a way around it, no matter how illogical.

If that doesn't stop them in their tracks you can always bring up the fact that there are numerous creation and flood myths. It seems reasonable that if we are going to teach one religions creation myth as science we should teach all the creation and flood myths as SCIENCE. After all who needs real SCIENCE when a myth will do.