Justice H. Walter Croskey of the 2nd District Court of Appeals in California wrote those words in a a Feb. 28 opinion is a case involving home schooling. The ruling requires that parents who home school their children have valid teaching credentials. From The Los Angeles Times:
“This decision is a direct hit against every home schooler in California,” said Brad Dacus, president of the Pacific Justice Institute, which represents the Sunland Christian School, which specializes in religious home schooling. “If the state Supreme Court does not reverse this . . . there will be nothing to prevent home-school witch hunts from being implemented in every corner of the state of California.”
The institute estimates there are as many as 166,000 California students who are home schooled. State Department of Education officials say there is no way to know the true number.
Unlike at least 30 other states, home schooling is not specifically addressed in California law. Under the state education code, students must be enrolled in a public or private school, or can be taught at home by a credentialed tutor.
The California Department of Education currently allows home schooling as long as parents file paperwork with the state establishing themselves as small private schools, hire credentialed tutors or enroll their children in independent study programs run by charter or private schools or public school districts while still teaching at home.
What utter garbage… As California is well-known for being revitalizing the use of the voter initiated constitutional amendment process, concerned Californians should immediately start working on an amendment to guarantee the right to home school. I’d love to see that as an issue in the presidential campaign…
Perhaps it’s just coincidence that the very same edition of the Times has a story about a special education assistant convicted of stealing the lunch money of an student 57 times over a three month period…
