The legislature is in session--and here are some bills of interest to homeschoolers.

 

Senate Education Committee
Chair:	Senator Florence Shapiro	Addison	R
Vice-Chair:	Senator Royce West	Dallas	D
	Senator Kip Averitt	Waco	R
	Senator Kyle Janek	Houston	R
	Senator Steve Ogden	College Station	R
	Senator Todd Staples	Palestine	R
	Senator Leticia Van de Putte	San Antonio	D
	Senator Tommy Williams	The Woodlands	R
	Senator Judith Zaffirini	Laredo	D

Homeschoolers Would Have to Register Under S.B. 586. 

Why? Because apparently parents are withdrawing their kids from school and then not actually educating them!  In other words, they're covering up for their dropouts!  Obviously, parents who withdraw their children to enroll in a traditional private school are far more trustworthy since the bill doesn't require them to fill out any form.

And parents who state that they're withdrawing their child to enroll in an out of state school or even out an of country school are far more reliable than home school parents.

Never mind that a parent who already lied to the district once would probably have no problem doing so again or how will having homeschooling elementary kids register improve the high school dropout rate reporting system.  Nope, there's something else going on here.

I suspect this has something to do with the 50% increase in the number of kids who are listed as withdrew to homeschool from the 1997 to 2000 school years.

Now any homeschooler will tell that the high rate simply reflects an increasing number of people realizing the benefits of homeschooling.  Maybe. But I also suspect that more homeschooling kids return to school in high school rather than just start homeschooling for the first time.  Again, this is just based on personal observation, but I know most people who are pulling their kids out to homeschool for the first time are strongly encouraged not to sign anything.

Which brings me to my suspicions as to what might be going on. In the Texas Education Agency's never ending quest to improve dropout reporting, it has developed a system of leaver codes.  Depending on how the students are classified, they will be counted as part of a campus dropout rate.  So students who intend to enroll in another public school are not considered dropouts.

While I don't believe the schools have some sort of organized conspiracy to misrepresent the dropout rate, I do know that when I was doing dropout research and interning at the TEA, that schools happily ignored "summer" dropouts since they weren't enrolled at the time. As reporting systems have become more detailed, the agency has been able to track down such abuses.

So what does this have to do with homeschoolers?  Well, ultimately, the legislature doesn't trust the school districts.  Now presumably, TEA is much better at tracking down students who end up at other public schools then it used to be so schools can't fudge too much with these numbers. There's also the private school option but there are only so many private schools available and a jump in numbers would be suspicious.

Of course, the school could try the out of state approach, as if anyone would consider leaving Texas.  But then such transfer rates could be compared to those of the local elementary schools or local census data.  So how about those homeschoolers?!

Are schools using the intent to homeschool option to mask dropouts which caused the over 50% category increase from 1997 to 2000?  Who knows?  What the people in Austin do know is that our very own San Antonio Express News published a dropout study concerning Holmes High School.  And guess what?  It reported the following:

Unfortunately, the article didn't provide the total number of students listed as homeschooled nor state what she did during her three years.  It does suggest that all homeschoolers get a G.E.D. or some sort of diploma which is not required nor true.  But in this case, a real person is worth a thousand deceiving homeschoolers.

TEA could compare the homeschool leaver rate for secondary schools to primary schools but they may take awhile to get to that.  In the meantime, the legislature, which remember, doesn't trust the school districts, will make them produce forms signed by parents stating that they're homeschooling. So they will try to legislate the potential loophole out of existence which at best (or worst as the case maybe), accounts for less than one percent of school leavers.

Ultimately, in a very bizarre and twisted way, homeschoolers could feel complemented--at least the state trusts them more than the reporting school officials.  Flattery aside, contact your legislator and let them know how you really feel.