Is anybody asking the questions, “Why is it so important for legislators to chase down the few homeschoolers who ‘may’ be falling through the cracks?” and “Why aren’t we more interested in meeting the needs of the mega-multitude of public school students we ‘know’ are falling through the cracks?”
Today, in Springfield, Illinois, literally hundreds of freedom loving, independent thinking, hard working home educators filled the state capitol to protest the hearing of a bill, SB 136, that would choke the life from their parental rights to freely and without government encroachment homeschool their children. The bill would require parents to register with the state and submit records and other materials at the state’s discretion. The St. Louis Post Dispatch reported:
Maloney, in testimony, expressed surprise at the outrage over the bill. “The majority of parents do an exemplary job” at homeschooling, he said. He said the concern is those who use their right to homeschool as merely an excuse to let their kids stay out of school.
When we know that homeschoolers, as a general demographic, do better at educating their children than their publicly educated counterparts, why is government so eager to get their grip on the free thinking mustangs of the populace and rein them in?
My gut tells me it’s a ‘follow the money’ issue or perhaps it’s just about control and power. With all the hub-bub concerning the sweeping education reform from the federal government and the part Race To The Top plays in the plan, one wonders about the grand design of harnessing the minds of the young to further socialist political agendas. How can you insist on RT3’s Common Core Standards or longitudinal data systems if you have all these wild and independent thinking private and homeschoolers running loose in the culture? Does anybody wonder if gaining control of homeschoolers is just the first step in a much larger agenda? I am guessing hundreds of critically thinking educated homeschoolers are.
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