What it takes to be Homeschool Parent

With all the frequent negative portrayals and comments about homeschooling in the media, it's nice to see a very accurate, positive portrayal for a change. Check it out here!

California Homeschooling Case to be Re-heard

According to the Home School Legal Defense Association, the Court of Appeals has agreed to re-hear the recent court case threatening homeschooling in California:

On March 25, the California Court of Appeal granted a motion for rehearing in the In re Rachel L. case—the controversial decision which purported to ban all homeschooling in that state unless the parents held a teaching license qualifying them to teach in public schools.

The automatic effect of granting this motion is that the prior opinion is vacated and is no longer binding on any one, including the parties in the case.

This is good news: At minimum, parents without teaching credentials are no longer considered criminals for doing what's in the best interests of their children. And hopefully, the Court will rule permanently in favor of the right of parents to homeschool their children.

Unpublished (see below) Letter to the L.A. Times on Homeschooling

In response to the a rather nasty op-ed on 3/13 in the Los Angeles Times, I wrote the following letter to the editor. Today, letters in response to the op-ed were published and mine was not among them.

Re: Coombs & Shaffer Regulating Homeschoolers 3/13/2008

As a secular homeschooler I strongly resent Professors Coombs & Shafffer's attempt to pigeonhole all homeschoolers as some kind of religious nut cases who leave the education of their children to television. My six year-old daughter is studying American history, geography, grammar, spelling, vocabulary, cursive handwriting, literature, mathematics, and science. In addition she takes ballet and art lessons and has more friends than I am able to keep track of. A child's education, like a child's upbringing ought to be a parent's responsibility and prerogative. In the absence of specific evidence of abuse or neglect the state has no right to interfere.

Update 3/18: The letter was featured as the last of five in the L.A. Times Blog.

California Resolution on Homeschooling

A resolution has been introduced in the California legislature by Assemblyman Joel Anderson to express support for homeschooling and call on the California Supreme Court to overturn the recent decision that implied that state-approved teaching credentials were required for parents who wish to homeschool their children. Here are some excerpts:

WHEREAS, Home schooling by California families with diverse
backgrounds has historically given children a quality education
through proven, independent approaches that nurture valuable
family bonds and support successful pupil development...
...
Resolved by the Assembly of the State of California, the Senate
thereof concurring, That the Legislature hereby calls upon the
California Supreme Court to reverse the opinion of the California
Court of Appeal for the second Appellate District in the case of
In re Rachel L., that home schooling without a teaching credential
is not legal...

My wife and I intend to write my Assemblyman to encourage him to support this resolution. California residents reading this are encouraged to do the same.

Requiring Parents to Provide an Education for their Child

In a comment on my previous post on homeschooling, Burgess Laughlin issued a friendly challenge:

Should the state require parents to provide any education? If so, what is the justification?

Here is my answer to this challenge.

The parents have the obligation to provide for the child. What does this mean? Well, the child is born helpless. It did not ask to be born. The parents, having chosen the bring the child into existence, take upon them the responsibilities of its development from a helpless infant into a self-sufficient adult.

What are these responsibilities? Since man (including a child) is an integrated being of mind and body, the responsibilities divide into physical and mental. The physical include such things as food, clothing and shelter. The mental include such things as teaching the child how to speak.

Furthermore, as part of bringing the child to the point where he is self-sufficient, he must be provided with at least the rudiments of knowledge necessary for such independence. This is culturally contextual. As Branden pointed out in The Objectivist Newsletter, in a more primitive society that might mean teaching your child how to hunt. In our more advanced, knowledge-based society, it means teaching him reading, writing and arithmetic. Of course, parents should and typically will teach their child much more (history, science, literature, etc). However, with the 3R essentials the child can complete the process on his own, whereas without that basic knowledge he is left without even the means to develop his knowledge further.

Thus it is proper, as part of the parent's obligation to provide for the child's transition to independence, for the state to require that the parent arrange for the teaching of at least these fundamentals so that an essential part of the child's independence is achieved. However, absent specific evidence to the contrary, the state should assume that the parents are fulfilling their obligation. Parents, just like everybody else, are innocent until proven guilty. It also remains a difficult question as to the exact time frame by which the state can require this obligation to be fulfilled. For example if a child has not learned to read by age 9, should the state intervene? How about age 14? I support early education but have not yet thought this aspect of the issue clearly through. However, the requirement itself derives from the parent's obligation to provide for the child's transition to independence.

Thoughts on homeschooling

The aforementioned California court case is now getting a lot of press. I think it is important to review the basic moral issues of homeschooling before one tackles the legal issues. This is my attempt to formulate the moral case for the right of parents to homeschool their children.

Let's begin with the idea that parents as human beings have a right to life, liberty and property. Ayn Rand stated it best when she wrote:

A "right" is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man's freedom of action in a social context. There is only one fundamental right (all the others are its consequences or corollaries): a man's right to his own life. Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action; the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and self-generated action—which means: the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life. (Such is the meaning of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.)

The issue becomes a little more complicated when a couple decides to have children but they do not lose their rights in the process. Instead, the issue of responsibility for one's actions comes into play:

A child is the responsibility of his parents, because (a) they brought him into existence, and (b) a child, by nature, cannot survive independently. ...
The essence of parental responsibility is: to equip the child from independent survival as an adult. This means, to provide for the child's physical and mental development and well-being: to feed, clothe and protect him; to raise him in a stable, intelligible, rational home environment, to equip him intellectually, training him to live as a rational being; to educate him to earn his livelihood
(from The Objectivist Newsletter, Vol.1, No.12, December 1962, Intellectual Ammunition Department, Nathaniel Branden)

Thus just like food, clothing and shelter, the responsibility of education logically falls on the shoulders of the people bringing the child into this world. At this point, one wonders where the idea that the government should be involved in a child's education comes from. Properly, the government's role ought be limited to its proper functions, namely the protection of individual rights:

The only proper purpose of a government is to protect man's rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence. A proper government is only a policeman, acting as an agent of man's self-defense, and, as such, may resort to force only against those who start the use of force. The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law.
(from the entry Government, Ayn Rand Lexicon)

By bringing a child into the world, the parents have incurred certain obligations toward the child. Thus it is correct to say that the government should enforce these obligations as part of its protection of the rights of all individuals, including children. The government should step in if the child is unjustly abused and protect the child's right to life, or if it is neglected to the point where its physical and mental health are seriously threatened. This would require objective legal definitions of harm or abuse that would trigger a police visit.

However, as long as the parents make a reasonable effort to provide the basic necessities listed in the above quote, the government ought to protect the parent in their right to fulfill their responsibilities as they see fit. It is not for the government to decide the specific means by which the obligations are fulfilled. Just as the government does not legally require children to attend specially formulated communal meals or require parents to be credentialed nutritionists, but instead wisely leaves the issue of food for parents to decide, as long as they don't starve the child. Similarly, when it comes to education, as long as the parent provides the fundamentals of reading, writing and arithmetic, the state ought not to interfere. The parent can choose (as we are) to provide quite a bit more at home, or have the children privately tutored or send the children to a school of the parent's choosing. However, I see no reason for government involvement in schooling outside of the aforementioned minimal check. I would also want the government to treat all parents as innocent until proven guilty. There always needs to be some cause, some evidence for government involvement. Comments welcome.

Homeschooling under attack

As some of my readers know, my wife and I decided some time ago to homeschool our kids and are quite happy with the results. Unfortunately, as a homeschooler, depending on where one lives, one is constantly worried about the government taking away your right to teach your kids as you see fit. A recent court case in California, which asserts that children have to be sent to a brick and mortal school or taught by a "credentialled" teacher is particularly worrisome. It seems that the case began with allegations of abuse but when, upon investigation, it was discovered that the family had homeschooled its children, authorities attempted to force the family to send the kids to a regular school. The first court case supported the parent's right to home school, but this latest case overturned the initial decision. Here's an excerpt from the latest decision:

The trial court’s reason for declining to order public or private schooling for the children was its belief that parents have a constitutional right to school their children in their own home. However, California courts have held that under provisions in the Education Code, parents do not have a constitutional right to home school their children. Thus, while the petition for extraordinary writ asserts that the trial court’s refusal to order attendance in a public or private school was an abuse of discretion, we find the refusal was actually an error of law. It is clear to us that enrollment andattendance in a public full-time day school is required by California law for minor children unless (1) the child is enrolled in a private full-time day school and actually attends that private school, (2) the child is tutored by a person holding a valid state teaching credential for the grade being taught, or (3) one of the other few statutory exemptions to compulsory public school attendance (Ed. Code, § 48220 et seq.) applies to the child. Because the parents in this case have not demonstrated that any of these exemptions apply to their children, we will grant the petition for extraordinary writ.[emphasis added]

Regardless of the particular ideas and standing of these particular parents, it is important to support the right of all parents to control the education of their children as a basic right. I was under the impression that California by and large supported this right. It seems I might have been mistaken.