DID SOMEONE SEND OUT AN E-LERT?
There’s trouble a-brewing in AZ:
The law of unintended consequences strikes again . . . In what started as an effort to help out a constituent on the remote Navajo reservation, Sen. Albert Hale, D-Window Rock, has gotten himself and fellow members of the Senate Education Committee sucked into a maelstrom known as angry home-school parents.
Hale’s Senate Bill 1527 would allow high school students older than 16 to register for school without a parent or guardian. Some of the parents on the reservation don’t have cars to get to school with their child (who gets to the school on a bus, apparently). Besides, a 16-year-old can quit school without Mom or Dad’s permission, right?
Well, a large group of parents who home-school their kids have come unglued. Dozens of nearly identical e-mails to Education Committee members over the past week attack the bill as a “direct violation of a parent’s fundamental right to choose the best education for their children.”
One parent wrote, “Contrary to the believe (sic) of the NEA (National Education Association) there are competent parents rearing their children that do not have to be associated with public schools nor baby sitted (sic) by the government.”
OK. But apparently there is a fear that if some home-schooled kids had a choice, they’d sneak right out of the house and register for public school. Well, no need to worry. Sen. Ron Gould, a Lake Havasu Republican who home-schools his children and serves as the committee’s vice chairman, plans an amendment that would exempt home-schoolers.
Boy, that makes us look good, huh?
UPDATE: Round up the usual suspects.
Action Requested:
Please call and email all the Senate K-12 Education Committee Members listed below and give them this message:“Please defeat Senate Bill 1527. This bill directly violates a parent’s fundamental right to choose the best education for their children.
This bill could be potentially harmful for children who are least able to make the best decision in an area as vitally important as education.”
Do not identify yourself as a homeschooler, instead you can identify yourself as a concerned parent and taxpaying citizen.
Baaaa. Baaaaa.
One Response to “DID SOMEONE SEND OUT AN E-LERT?”
Comment by Art Tracy February 12th, 2006 at 10:09 am |
“a maelstrom known as angry home-school parents” I think this would be a great name for a homeschool advocacy group! |