Not Your Kids
Kim du Toit
March 13, 2008
9:09 AM CDT
A whole bunch of people have written to me to ask why I didn’t comment on this piece of legal bastardy:
In a blow to parents everywhere, the Los Angeles 2nd District Court of Appeals ruled last week that under provisions in the state’s education code, parents do not have a constitutional right to home school their children and in fact criminalizes efforts to do so since they are not certified teachers.
Ummmm it’s California (People’s Soviet of). Why should I be surprised that, in the manner of statist pricks everywhere, some liberal asswipe of a judge has decreed that parents are not qualified to teach their kids propery? The foolishness continues:
One National Education Association (NEA) official has referred to home-school parents as “gullible, amateurs” who don’t have the skills to teach their own children.
...
University of San Diego law Professor Shaun Martin told the San Diego Union-Tribune that the ruling means “parents no longer have the right to home school their kid any way they want.”
Yeah… NEA-certified teachers have done such a great job of educating our kids. This would explain why, in just about every field and by any yardstick imaginable, home-schooled kids clean the clocks of their State-educated peers.
Home-schooled kids win spelling bees, win all sorts of writing competitions, have a higher GPA than high-school graduates, and have lower drop-out rates in college. Strikes me that we homeschoolers are not the gullible ones, and compared to the results earned by the “professionals”, we amateurs can wear the mantle proudly.
None of that is the point. The comparative education standards between home-schooled kids and public-schooled kids is a dead issue: it’s over, finished, kaput—home-schooled kids and their parents have won: game, set and match.
So why are “the authorities” so worried about The Children that they have to rely on liberal asswipe judges to make rulings against homeschooling?
When in doubt, follow the money. The fewer kids enrolled in public schools, the less federal and state money the school gets. Here’s a little more financial incentive. Every time the public education system is shown to be lacking, the pressure grows for them to have their performance measured, tested, and corrected. This, of course, is total anathema to the unions, who consider their job done if they show up and remain conscious for the duration of the school day.
And finally, of course, is the statist mindset that your children are not yours, but the property of the State. Only Big Nanny can be trusted to educate your children: you rubes and amateurs can only harm them.
Right.
Of greater concern is the often-correct saying that “as goes California, so goes the rest of the country”:
The ruling is estimated to impact more than 166,000 California children who are currently taught at home. And the chilling effect could move beyond California. Prior to the court’s decision, home-school advocates say they have already seen an increase in the number of anti-home schooling bills this year. The state of Nebraska — one case in point — nearly banned home schooling after legislation crafted by a state senator called for an overhaul. She was forced to back down when the governor threatened to veto it.
Bah. I don’t know the facts, but I will offer odds that the aforesaid Nebraska state senator was either a teacher, or someone involved with state education.
We are past the age of homeschooling our kids—all three are in college, and doing fine, thank you. In addition, Texas is (so far) a very friendly state for homeschoolers (conservative CA residents, take note; hippies, go somewhere else).
But The Mrs. and I are looking forward to being spared to homeschool our grandchildren in future years, and if some federal- or state apparatchik ever threatens to prevent us from doing so, watch me go to the guns.
Yes, I feel that strongly about it.
