Homeschooling Family Granted Political Asylum

“This decision finally recognizes that German homeschoolers are a specific social group that is being persecuted by a Western democracy,” said Mike Donnelly, staff attorney and director of international relations for Home School Legal Defense Associaton.

“It is embarrassing for Germany, since a Western nation should uphold basic human rights, which include allowing parents to raise and educate their own children. This judge understood the case perfectly, and he called Germany out. We hope this decision will cause Germany to stop persecuting homeschoolers,” he added.

Read more here. The story also appeared on the Guardian, the Deutsche Welle, the Local, and in spanish here.

UPDATE: Commenting on this, Ed West says here that the British Government is trying to make homeschooling even harder because he suspects many of the parents are religious.

Dealing with truancy, the american way

Simple! Tag the children with GPS Tracking Devices!


More here and here.

NH Home Schoolers Protest!

"New Hampshire home educators protesting proposed government regulations making NH the most difficult state to home school. It is a short account of why these ordinary families came out in frigid New England weather to voice their concerns to the New Hampshire legislature. A suprising mix of people with differing political, religious and social views gathered in a unified stance against their representatives."

UPDATE:
N.H. Homeschoolers Praise Vote Against Tighter Regulations
The N.H. House of Representatives rejected a bill that would tightly regulate homeschooling. The state House voted 324-34 against changes to the current law.

Home education and the children, schools and families bill

* The Guardian, Monday 11 January 2010

We believe that schedule 1 of the children, schools and families bill represents an unacceptable imposition of state control over families. Although it is aimed at children educated outside the school system, it has implications for all families.

Most parents would not make home-based education their first choice; but any family might need it if school seriously failed their child. Currently, this choice is lawfully available to all parents. If enacted, the bill would – for the first time – transfer responsibility for a child's education from the parents to the state. We believe this is a matter which should be of great concern to everyone.

A change in the law is unnecessary. Parents are already required by law to provide an education suitable to the age, aptitude and ability of their children, and to any special educational needs they may have. Local authorities already have the power to take action if parents do not do this.

Evidence indicates that home education is highly effective. Many home educating families use child-led educational methods which lie outside the prevailing educational paradigm. Diversity in education is precious in a democracy, and we need the law to protect it, and to protect the best interests of each individual child.

The interests of children are strikingly absent from schedule 1, which is concerned mainly with setting up a bureaucratic system administered by local authorities. They would be given the power to deny parents permission to home-educate, at any time, unless parents adapt their educational approach to fit in with the requirements of the system. The resulting insecurity would be damaging to many children, especially those with special educational needs.

Schedule 1 contravenes two principles of the government's own children's plan: that families bring up children, not governments; and that services need to be shaped by and responsive to children, young people and families, not designed around professional boundaries. Given the controversy surrounding this section of the bill, and the serious criticisms made of it by the children, schools and families select committee, we call on the government to withdraw schedule 1 of the bill, and the accompanying clauses.

Ralph Lucas House of Lords, Oliver James, Child clinical psychologist, Anne Fine, Dr Frank Furedi Professor of sociology, Professor Anna Craft University of Exeter, Michele Elliott Founder of Kidscape, Professor Roger Scruton, Graham Stuart MP Chair, all-party parliamentary group on home education, Michael A Peters Professor, educational policy studies, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Professor Brian Thorne Fellow, British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy, Professor Emeritus Janet Moyles Early years and play consultant, Tricia David Emeritus professor of education, Canterbury Christ Church University, Professor Andrew Samuels University of Essex, Professor Tony Kouzarides Cancer research scientist at Cambridge University, Professor Ian Cunningham Chair of educational charity, Dr Sacha Powell Acting director, Centre for Research into Children, Families and Communities, Canterbury Christ Church University, Dr Felicity de Zulueta Consultant psychiatrist in psychotherapy and honorary senior lecturer at King's College London, Fiona Carnie Vice-president, European Forum for Freedom in Education, Dr Alan Thomas Visiting fellow at University of London Institute of Education, Harriet Pattison Research Associate, School of Education, University of London, Dr Richard House Senior lecturer in therapeutic education, Roehampton University, Peter Humphreys Chair, trustee, director, The Centre for Personalised Education and Personalised Education Now, Veronika Robinson Editor, The Mother magazine, Sue Palmer Literacy specialist and author of Toxic Childhood, Dani Ahrens Open letter co-ordinator, Badman Review Action Group, Roland Meighan The Centre for Personalised Education Trust, Dr Teresa Belton Educational researcher, Dr Ben Anderson Department of sociology, University of Essex, Melanie Gill Forensic psychologist, Claire Fox Director, Institute of Ideas, Vincent Nolan Trustee, Synectics Education Initiative, Dr Marilyn Fryer, Director, The Creativity Centre, John Harris Professional storyteller/children's author, Norman Wells Director, Family Education Trust, Derry Hannam Researcher/adviser/trainer in education for democratic citizenship to Council of Europe, UK government and NGOs, Liz Steinthal Educare Small School, Dr L Safran Educationist, Chloe Watson Chair, Home Educated Youth Council, Cathy Koetsier Media officer, Home Education Advisory Service, Kathleen Thompson Committee member of Education Everywhere helpline, Annette Taberner Trustee of Education Otherwise, Kelly L Green Founding member of Freedom and Choice in Education, British Columbia, Wendy Priesnitz Founder of Canadian Alliance of Home Schoolers, editor of Life Learning magazine, Beverley Paine Editor Home Education Association Australia publications, Deborah Markus Editor, Secular Homeschooling Magazine and more than 1,000 other signatories (for a full list see http://is.gd/5ViV7)

Home-ed news links

North-East and North Yorkshire parents fighting a town hall crackdown if they choose to educate their children at home have won support from MPs after an investigation. Read it here.

South Yorkshire parents who educate their children at home gathered in Sheffield city centre as part of a national protest against proposed 'big brother' reforms which could become law next year. More here.

In Northumberland, MP joins condemnation of home-education red tape. Read it here.

Select committee criticises plans to monitor home-education

The Select Committee Report is now available here. Pdf version here.

Balls's plans for home education should be scaled back, Sheerman says. Select committee criticises plans to monitor home-educating families as 'too aggressive'. Read it here.

Change urged for home-school plan - Parents who choose to home-school their child should not be forced to register with their local council, a cross-party group of MPs has said. More here...

More parents 'educating children at home' - Growing numbers of parents are shunning state schools to educate their children at home, according to MPs. Here.

The Big Question: Should the parents of home-schooled children be forced to register? - Why are we asking this now? A report by the House of Commons Select Committee covering education, published this morning, is highly critical of the Government's plan to tighten up on regulations governing home education. Read it here.

Badman review blasted by MPs' inquiry - A cross-party inquiry into Graham Badman's controversial review of home education has labelled the government's handling of the issue as an unfortunate episode. More here.

LOCAL NEWS

Home truths for city MP - Parents who choose to teach their children at home say meddling officials need to be taught a lesson. Read more...

Home schooling petition launched - PRO-HOME schooling campaigners have submitted a Parliamentary petition aiming to block legislation designed to give education bosses ‘stronger powers than the police’. Read more...

Parents fury at plan for lessons in home - Mother Jo Coulter, who educates her nine-year-old daughter Stella at home, said:

“I am absolutely horrified at the thought that in the name of child protection, thousands of children would be subjected to this degree of exposure to strangers within their own homes. We are automatically being treated as if we have done something wrong. It is deeply offensive that families like mine should be subjected to this degrading treatment. Why stop at home-educating families? Why not extend these measures throughout the land to cover all homes? After all, schoolchildren only spend around seven hours a day in school. Why are they spending all this money to police home education? There are already systems in place through social services to protect vulnerable children. They are knocking on the wrong door.”
Read more...

Despite all the opposition, some MPs criticise absence of home-school regulation: Parents who teach their children at home should be more closely monitored by local authorities, a group of MPs have said. Read more...

Thoughts on the Home Ed bill

Jo Coulter, who educates her child at home, said:

“I am absolutely horrified at the thought that in the name of child protection, thousands of children in my country would be subjected to this degree of exposure to strangers, within their own homes. Such treatment I thought was reserved for those suspected of committing a crime.

Indeed, why stop at home educating families? Why not extend these measures throughout the land to cover all homes? After all, if school children only spend around seven hours a day in school, this leaves them out of ‘school protection’ for nearly seventeen hours a day, on week days, forty-eight hours at the weekend and many more over holidays. Indeed it is questionable if children are at all safe anywhere, even when they are in school. It is deeply offensive that families like mine should be subjected to this degrading treatment. I have not yet met anyone within my constituency who finds it acceptable.” Read more here.

§§§§§§§§§§

Michael Donnelly, staff attorney and director of international relations for the Home School Legal Defense Association, said: "This bill is breathtaking in its scope and reflects a perverse level of suspicion towards parents who home-educate their children".

Norman Wells, director of the Family Education Trust, which promotes stable family life and children's welfare, told HSLDA the background checks wouldn't make any sense.

"If it is deemed unsafe for children to be with their parents during normal school hours, it is equally unsafe for them to be with their parents in the evenings, at weekends and during the school holidays," he said. "To impose a system of routine monitoring home-educating families would represent a breach of their right to a private and family life and constitute a waste of public resources. Furthermore, the proposal to grant the local authority a statutory right of access to the homes of home-educated children is in effect reversing the presumption of innocence in British law and treats parents with suspicion until they have proven themselves innocent." Taken from here.

Home educators in record petition of MPs

They call on England's ministers not to go ahead with plans for a register or with proposals for council officials to be given new powers to enter homes. Ministers say the reforms will check children are "safe and learning". Read it here.

In South Devon, home educators unite to fight new legislation and protect their civil liberties. Leaf Lovejoy, who is educating two of her three children at home, said:

"This new legislation flies in the face of what home education is. It's completely absurd and would extend centralised control over parents and children. It would be an attack on our civil liberties. What this legislation proposes to do is to reverse what's existing now. At present the state reports to parents. That's what Ofsted reports are about. Under the new legislation, parents would be reported to the state. This is a massive invasion of privacy. This is a clever ruse by the Government to control parents, licence them. But this report is flawed and based on flawed statistics. It's families who provide for their children's education, whether it's in the home or at school. As home educators we have nothing to hide, but everything to fear from this report and from maverick local authorities."

Also on the news:

Now parents face criminal checks just to enter their children's school. More here.

Mass petitions against home education clampdown

A total of 74 MPs from across the three main parties are set to present more than 120 petitions containing thousands of signatures to Parliament tonight (Tue) opposing Government plans to bring in strict registration and monitoring of home educated children, thanks to Beverley and Holderness MP Graham Stuart. The mass presentation will break the record for the number of petitions presented to Parliament on a single issue on any one day. The previous record was 44 petitions presented on 28 March 2006 against cuts and closures to community hospitals. Read it here. Also on Press Association and Wales Online.



Here, we read that dozens of MPs lined up to deliver petitions from constituents urging the government not to go ahead with proposals to shake up home education. Graham Stuart (Con, Beverley and Holderness) said people from more than 120 constituencies officially opposed the compulsory registration of home educating families in England.

Two Hampshire MPs last night delivered petitions of thousands of signatures against proposals to tighten the rules on parents who educate their children at home. Read it here.

MP for Preseli Pembrokeshire, Stephen Crabb, will tonight (Tuesday) present a petition to the House of Commons on behalf of Pembrokeshire's home educators. Read it here.

Sutton MPs Tom Brake and Paul Burstow have received a petition from home educators concerned about the recommendations of an upcoming report. See here.

Newbury MP, Richard Benyon last night submitted a petition to Parliament on behalf of parents who wish to educate their children at home. This small but determined group of parents are appalled at Government plans to place many admirable home educators under an unwarranted cloud of suspicion. From here.

Home educating parents bullied by authorities

Miscarriage of justice in Australia

Now we must undergo criminal records checks

Parents who teach their own children at home must undergo criminal records checks, say Government education inspectors.

Read more

Parents and children are speaking out against proposed changes to the home education system which could see youngsters cross-examined for hours on end. A petition was handed over to MP for Lincoln criticising the Badman Review which called for stricter regulation of home schooled children.

Read more

Home ed news round

PARENTS who educate their children at home say the government is trying to introduce draconian new laws to interfere in family life. More here...

PARENTS protesting against government proposals to impose strict rules which will regulate home education are preparing to hand in petitions to parliament opposing the plans. Read it here.

Mr. Graham Stuart: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how many staff are engaged (a) full-time and (b) part-time on handling responses to his Department's consultation on Home education-registration and monitoring proposals. From here.

Brushing off labels such as "hippie" and "religious nut", and debunking the socialisation myth, Nicola Pye followed natural progression and took a stand for freedom to home-school her children. Read it here.

A mother and father in Germany were fined $181 for homeschooling their children by a judge who spared them the jail sentences demanded by the prosecutor. More here. Also here.

Is homeschooling compatible with socialism and vice-versa? Apparently not, for homeschooling means parental control of education, and that is anathema to socialists. More here...

The British government announced last week their acceptance of the Badman Review of home education and introduced the new Children, Schools and Families Bill that will require home educated children to be registered with the local authorities. Read it here. Also here.

Home schooling doesn't have to negatively affect socialization - here.

Meantime, in the schooling world...
Criminal checks for all sixth formers
Tory plans for 'no notice' school detentions

MP to receive petition over home education

YEOVIL MP David Laws will this morning receive a petition from families across his constituency protesting against draft legislation regulating home education.
Read more...

Declaration to Parliament - Notice of refusal to co-operate

The following notice has been going round...

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN

WHEREAS the recommendations of the GRAHAM BADMAN REVIEW OF ELECTIVE HOME EDUCATION have been accepted in full by the Secretary of State.

AND that these grossly disproportionate recommendations hold serious implications for the civil liberties of parents, children and families in this country.

AND that these recommendations place primary responsibility for assessing the suitability of education and the welfare of the child on the state, rather than the parent - with no prior evidence that either is unsatisfactory prior to this grossly intrusive intervention.

AND that the recommendations of the review assumes that the home is an inherently unsafe or unhealthy place for the child to be.

AND that these recommendations undermine the role of the parent and trample over family freedoms in its haste to set parent and child up against each other, bestowing additional and selective "rights" on home educated children that only the government can adequately minister to.

AND that these recommendations destroy the very possibility of true autonomy in learning.

AND that these recommendations operate from a position of requiring proof of parental innocence rather than reasonable suspicion of guilt.

AND that these recommendations discriminatorily use the coercive and interventionist tools of parental licensing, warrantless entry to the home, inspection according to arbitrary external standards, and an unconscionable new power to interrogate the child without the parents present.

AND that the outcome of these recommendations will be horribly discriminatory to a minority community, the measures eventually having to apply to anyone who has their child at home with them: parents with under 5s, those whose children attend private school, and also those with school-aged children who are at home in the evenings, over the weekends, and throughout the summer holidays.

AND that the outcome of these inspections will be based on the very human whim and prejudices of a local authority officer, who will have the power to destroy the life and education that that parent has conceived for his or her child.

AND that if the government is to avoid further discrimination it also stands to reason that each child who attends school must be given the same "rights" as home educated children - to "have their voices heard" regarding whether or not they are happy to be educated in school, whether they are satisfied with their teachers and whether they feel safe in such an environment.

WE ACCEPT that it is right that appropriate and proportionate action, as currently outlined in the law, may be taken to rectify a situation if there are serious concerns about a child's welfare, observing that a child being at home with its parents is not, and never has been, in and of itself a child welfare issue.

AND HEREBY RESOLVE that any such utterly disproportionate legislation if passed will fundamentally alter the relationship between citizen and state, and would constitute a fundamental violation of our rights,

AND that any such legislation is illegitimate on its face.

NOW UNDERSTAND that by this declaration, Parliament is PUT ON NOTICE that I and others will not co-operate with any such legislation, and strongly caution you not to consider, debate, or enact any such legislation.

Signed _______________________________

Declaration to Parliament - Notice of Refusal to Co-operate

Here, there and everywhere...
To find out more, go to:
Home education forums
Freedom in education
Maire Staffordshire
Blogdial
kelly green and gold
Renegade Parent (more here)
AHED
Billysu's
Nineteenthly
Learning Freely Network
Then UK
Ensino Doméstico - Educação Domiciliar

Unprecedented access to family homes

now given to health and safety inspectors to ensure that parents are protecting their children from household accidents.
Read more...

Also worth reading is this article, about the way Britain - "the most punitive nation in Europe" - continues to breach children's rights.

Results of Children's Survey & "Not Hidden" survey of HE families

At yesterday evening's parliamentary briefing event hosted by EO, Ann Newstead publicised the results of the surveys that she had carried out personally following the publication of the Badman Report.

The summary of the survey of home educated children and young people, which got 777 responses, can be found here.

The survey which asked home educating families to keep a diary for a week, to show that their children are not "hidden", which 500 families responded to, is summarised here.

Uncorrected Transcript of Oral Evidence

on EHE given by Graham Badman, Ms Diana Johnson and Penny Jones to the CSF Committee on Mon 12/10/09 available here.

Home Educators Mass Lobby of Parliament

From here: [Two days ago,] over 450 Home Educators and many supporters lobbied parliament today to protest against the Review of Elective Home Education chaired by Graham Badman.

UPDATE: CHANGES DISMAY HOME EDUCATORS

A FAMILY from Crediton took part in the recent mass lobby of Parliament in a bid to stop "intrusive" legislation affecting home education.

"We want to give our children an education that reflects our values and principles as opposed to those of a complete stranger. Some children thrive in a school system but I think I can do a better job myself. It's great to be in charge of what they're learning. You can't monitor what they do at school. It's my right to educate my children as I see fit." said Mrs Martin.

Read it here.

Home Ed Latest News

Home educators' worry at register
It is not known how many children in England are home educated
People who educate their children at home rather than sending them to school say they against having to register annually with local authorities.

Worthing home school families join campaign against new rules
PARENTS and their children from Worthing joined a campaign against government proposals to change the rules around home education.

Don't intrude, say parents who educate children at home
Home educators tell MPs they do not want home visits from local authorities, as recommended by a government review.

Home education vs. the bully-boy state
The presumption of guilt is eating it`s way into our lives: Home Education is the latest victim. As a parent you are a suspect in the crusade against child abuse. That is the message to Home Education from this government.Through a staged Review and now onto a Select Committee, the drive has been to find ways to justify an assault on Home Ed., taking away parental rights, enforcing child interviews alone and invading the family in a way that singles out Home Ed. as a "prime suspect".

The propaganda: Government To Provide More Support For Familes With Children Being Educated At Home