Homeschooling in California......

[Fish and Chips]

That's not what I meant... *Train of thought derails...*

If you don't expand your point, you'll run increased risk of people missing it.

[uc pseudonym]

This is anecdotal, but I hope the perspective will add something to the discussion.

One part of my extended family has chosen to home school their children, and by coincidence they live in California. However, their "home school" system bears no resemblance to what any of us would call education. Basically, their daughters are taught how to cook and clean until their marriage partners are chosen (no sons). From what I understand, they are able to do this because they are connected to a homeschooling program run by someone else who runs a government-recognized "long distance" program. Most of their kids are past this age by now, so this law won't affect them, but I rather suspect this situation would fall under the "lack of proper credentials" in the law at hand.

So all I mean to say is this: there is abuse or misuse of the system. This law is trying to reduce it. You can argue that this is a bad way to do it and that is fine. But I'm sure legislators weren't just sitting in their offices and trying to think of ways to muddle with their electorate.

[RidleyofZebes]

<_<;; California disappoints me. Why, oh Governator, why?

I've been homeschooled from first grade on and, I must say, it's been the best thing that could have happened to me. I'll be in 12th at the end of this summer, and I'm looking forward to it.

While I have an inkling of what pushed them to make such a ruling in California, I strongly believe they should have thought it through more carefully. I believe there were actions of lesser consequence which could and should have been taken, providing of course that the aforementioned presence of abusive-natured teachers[SIZE="1"][Citation Needed][/SIZE] was not on a worrying scale.

Seriously though, Why pick on the minority? Last I checked, there were more abusive parents sending their kids to a public school than being kind enough to teach their children at home. Let's get some priorities straight here, people!

[Raiden no Kishi]

I'll just say this: There's problems with both systems, but they're the parents' kids, not the government's, and I don't see where the government is entitled to control someone's kids' education. Plus, I still cast a wary eye in the direction of a group of fallen human beings who tend to be notorious for seeking power and holding onto it trying to gain control over what their citizens' children are taught. Also, the idea that homeschooled kids are somehow incapable of having friends their age is one of the most ignorant statements I've ever heard.

I'm done. End of line.

.rai//

[ShiroiHikari]

<_<]

Actually...if you look at the link in Mith's post, apparently Arnold is against the ruling.

Besides, it's not like the ENTIRE state believes this nonsense...

http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=218436

[Shao Feng-Li]

Tell you what though, I'd be more happy about [color="DimGray"]them taking our money[/color] paying taxes if they were more worried teaching kids how to take care of babies rather than make them (Luckily Mom didn't let any of us go through the sex-ed nonsense)

[Mithrandir]

So all I mean to say is this: there is abuse or misuse of the system. This law is trying to reduce it. You can argue that this is a bad way to do it and that is fine. But I'm sure legislators weren't just sitting in their offices and trying to think of ways to muddle with their electorate.

If this is not the focus of a web comic, it *totally* should be.

Official to aides: I've called you all here today because we haven't been seen in the news in nearly 2 weeks. The voters need to remember our names, or we won't get re-elected. I need recommendations on legislation that we can propose, which will probably not ever get passed. That way we can go on TV and appear indignant and stubborn and it will come across as righteousness!

On second thought, that may very well be what happens from time to time. Maybe this *shouldn't* be a web comic.

[Nate]

Plus, I still cast a wary eye in the direction of a group of fallen human beings who tend to be notorious for seeking power and holding onto it trying to gain control over what their citizens' children are taught.

This being CAA I'm unfortunately prohibited from saying what I'd like to in regards to this sentence...

I'd be more happy about them taking our money paying taxes

Yeah why does the government need money? Roads and bridges and courthouses and prisons should be built on hopes and dreams.

[Dante]

I have very strong opinions on this matter, even though I no longer have to worry about "the public re-education camp" as I once did. To put things into perspective, I was home schooled since the sixth grade by my mother, who was blind for about a year of my education and I would consider my education to be a success (I graduated from college with a degree in Physics for goodness sake). That stated, I would say that there are many reasons why parents choose to home school their children, and not all of them are given ample consideration.

For me, home schooling was a must, because the social situation between my public-school classmates and I was rapidly degenerating. That is to say, that there was generally a fight or several fights a week that resulted from provocations from other students (another failure of the sticks and stones policy). In other words, home schooling may serve as solution for students experiencing a continuing social environment in which the student is generally forced to undergo experiences that could result in physical or psychological harm to that student, to other students, or both.

As far as I am concerned, for the courts of California to require parents to keep their children enrolled in public schools or force them to re-enroll them, they must provide definite proof that these students will not undergo any physical or psychological harm that they would otherwise avoid if home schooled. Likewise, it is in the interest of the state to make sure that no student that is home schooled will receive physical or psychological damages from the experience as well. Given that the state has shown relatively little control over the actions between students in the school social setting, it seems unjust that these students should be forced to undergo damages that would normally be considered avoidable.

In the case of certain teen-age students (and even older children) the possibility also arises in which the student is no longer being taught by either parent, even though they are no longer enrolled in public school. There is an ever growing population of students that were enrolled in college at an early age and to whom the college environment was the primary source of learning within a year or two after enrolling. To these students, such a requirement would be devastating because it would interrupt their college careers. It is apparent that these students have fully ample parents, but they may not be “state certifiedâ€

[Debitt]

While I disagree with the method in which this is being implemented, I doubt that Californian legislators woke up one day and said 'Hey! Let's subject thousands of children from good, Christian homes to the horrible, moral and intellectual wasteland of the public school system!' It's an unfortunate that there are cases like the ones UC mentioned, but it isn't unreasonable to think that they played a heavy hand in this decision. Yes, I realize that there are some public school teachers that are inadequate as well, however I feel their being held to a set of standards may help dampen their ill effect on education.

I also agree with the concern that in some cases, a homeschooling system can be just as harmful to a child whom it isn't suited to as a public school system is to a child who isn't suited to that system. Like CogGear mentioned, there are sad instances where the amount of sheltering received in a homeschool environment can lead to shell shock when the kid enters college or a real world environment. I have strong opinions on the need to learn, in real-time, how to defend and maintain one's faith, but I don't think that's particularly in the scope of the topic.

At any rate, while I disagree with entirely removing the ability of parents to educate their children, I also think the image of the public school system as morally bankrupt and entirely incapable of education is a bit of an exaggeration.

EDIT: I'd also like to point out that while enforcing legislation like this may divert tax dollars out of the public school system, I'm sure that there are other, entirely unrelated pieces of legislation out there that do education budgets far more harm than this.

[ich1990]

It just so happens that I recently wrote a paper about home teaching for a reporter at our local newspaper. Here is my experience with home schooling.

I have been home schooled all of my life. My parents both worked together and devoted there spare time to my schooling. My parents used a tag team style to teaching. My Father taught me math, economics, and work skills while my Mother taught me everything else. As I got older, my parents had a hard time teaching me higher level math and foreign language courses. They didn’t have enough time to learn it themselves, then teach it to me, so I started going to college along with some other home schooled friends.

I went to my first college class, Spanish 130, at age 13. I continued to go to college for the next several years, so that I could supplement my home education. I graduated from high school at this year at age 17, and I am on track to complete my associates degree this year (at age 18).

I don’t believe that homeschooling is for everyone, however. Both the child and the parent must cooperate. The teacher must want to teach and the student must want to learn. The parent must also be able to devote large amounts of time to teach his/her child. It is a huge investment, but it pays off in the end.

Homeschooling benefits the child by providing education on a 1 on 1 basis. In addition, the child learns how to be proactive in his schooling. I quickly learned that if I got my school done early, I could be done with school early that day. Some days I would do two or three days worth of school, that way I could have an extra long weekend. If I didn’t get my school done one day, then I would have to do double school the next. This attitude helped me tremendously in college, were the student has to be organized and stay on top of his homework to get a good grade.

The common argument against home schooling is that home schooled children are socially inept and cannot function in the real world. This is the minority, not the majority. As I stated, homeschooling is not for everyone. The majority of home schooled students, however, are involved in some sort of extracurricular activity, such as a home school support group. These groups participate in sports, quiz bowls, literature appreciation clubs, chess clubs, etc. Many of these groups are just as large as public school groups. All of the home taught students that I know participate in one of these social groups and have had a much better, encouraging, and friendly learning experience than those I know who attended public school.

Most of all, home schooling allows kids to satisfy their own curiosity. As a home taught student, you form your curriculum around yourself, not the other way around.

Here are some interesting studies that I have found about home teaching. It seems that home schooled students, on a whole, do extremely well academically.

http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v7n8/
Is a study that tested 11,930 homeschooled families. It that states: “the achievement test scores of this group of home school students are exceptionally high--the median scores were typically in the 70th to 80th percentile”.

http://www.city-journal.org/html/10_3_an_a_for_home.html
Is a comprehensive article that states: “University of Maryland statistician Lawrence M. Rudner, examined some 20,000 home-schooled students from 50 states. These students scored higher on standardized tests than public and private school students in every subject and at every grade level. The longer their parents had home schooled them, the better they did. The results shocked the left-leaning Rudner, who initially believed that home schoolers were a bunch of "conservative nuts." He has changed his mind.”

My final conclusion, then, is that the parents should take an extremely active role in their child's education, weather they go to public school or not. There are a few cases were home taught students have been given a worse education than public students, and something should be done about this. I don't think that a blanket government law is the answer, however. There are way to many variables for one giant law to take care of the problem.