The current debate over Common Core State Standards is a continuation of many efforts by the federal and state governments since the 1980s to reform public schools by establishing standards and requiring public schools to comply with them. Initiatives such as Goals 2000, America 2000, No Child Left Behind, and Race to the Top all included standards. The version known as “Common Core State Standards” was announced in June 2009, and is sponsored by the National Governors’ Association, the Council of Chief State School Officers, and supported by most of the educational establishment. It also has widespread support from both political parties. Standards are one of the major reasons for the federal and state educational databases (discussed in the previous WPA Newsletter #114, page 13).

Opposition to Common Core State Standards is coming from some conservative organizations, some liberals, and teachers in New York state and Washington state who are boycotting them by refusing to administer tests associated with the standards.

Homeschoolers are not directly affected by these standards. Private schools, including homeschools, are not currently required to comply and are not likely to be in the foreseeable future, especially since these kinds of initiatives are ineffective, have not worked in the past, and are now being opposed by teachers.

WPA has opposed state and federal education standards for more than 20 years and continues to do so. Among the problems with standards are the facts that they take power away from families and local schools and give it to the government, emphasize one-size-fits-all education that does not work for many if not most children, and rely heavily on standardized testing that is unfair and inaccurate and interferes with learning.

Summary: Federal and state databases are gathering increasing amounts of personal data on public school students and undermine privacy. From the beginning, they have been supported by both Republicans and Democrats. Homeschoolers and other private school students are not supposed to be included, but parents need to take responsibility for understanding the issues involved, not being misled by inaccurate statements about the databases, and ensuring that their children are not included.

Background and Concerns
Several Wisconsin school districts are claiming that homeschoolers who enroll in their district’s virtual charter school can have the district pay some of the costs of their homeschooling and still continue to homeschool much as they have been. One example is Bridges Virtual Academy (BVA) in Merrill. For more information, see "New Version of Public School at Home Undermines Homeschooling in Wisconsin" in WPA Newsletter #112 (June 2012), page 10, reprinted here. 

The extent to which we maintain our parental rights and responsibilities depends on how we think, act, and react, especially when dealing with the public officials, including school officials.
The question of whether our child is officially enrolled in a public or conventional private school provides a good example of how we can think, act, and react. To maintain our rights, we can and should understand and make clear to others that "officially enrolled" means we have formally registered our child for the coming school year and/or sent our child to school when it opens in the fall.

School districts increasingly seem to want to claim that a child is enrolled until the child is formally withdrawn which sometimes requires a parent or guardian signing an official withdrawal form. But such practices assume that the school rather than the parent has control over a child during the summer and, more importantly, that the public school is where the child should be during public school hours unless the child is formally withdrawn. The compulsory attendance law states that a parent or guardian shall cause a child to attend a school. It is up to the parent or guardian to decide which school and to ensure that the child attends. The legal requirements and penalties have to do with whether a child is attending a school, not whether a child has been formally withdrawn from a school. Homeschoolers sometimes begin homeschooling in the middle of the school year. Filing the PI-1206 form is all that is necessary for this to happen. This acknowledges that the parent is responsible for their child in accordance with the statutes and does not require that parents sign a withdrawal form.
Please inform WPA if your local school officials claim your child is officially enrolled simply because they attended a public school last year or if they insist that you sign an official withdrawal form before beginning homeschooling.   v

Summary: A virtual charter school operated by a school district in central Wisconsin claims it will purchase curriculums and/or pay for private lessons for homeschoolers who enroll in this public virtual charter school, comply with its regulations, report to school officials, and have their children take standardized tests. Although the short-term benefits may be tempting to some homeschooling families, many other homeschoolers recognize the long-term threat to homeschooling as we know it in Wisconsin.

Important Note: This article is part of WPA’s continuing work to maintain homeschooling freedoms and inform homeschoolers and others about threats to our freedoms and other serious consequences of current developments. For some families, reasons to enroll in a program like Bridges Virtual Academy (BVA) are clear immediately while the serious consequences are less obvious. This article is intended to provide missing information so families can make educated decisions. Please join other homeschoolers working together through WPA to remind homeschoolers of the importance of our homeschooling freedoms and alert them to serious threats to that freedom.

Key Points

• Bridges Virtual Academy (BVA) will be unlikely to deliver the curriculum choices, including religiously based curriculum, and some other features it is claiming to offer.

• Because BVA is a public school, participating families will be regulated by the government. Former homeschoolers enrolled in BVA will surrender important freedoms.

• The program is on shaky ground. It clearly appears to be motivated more by money than education. It is likely to be challenged on questions of (1) spending taxpayers’ money without adequate accountability, (2) running a public school program without much involvement of certified teachers, and (3) violating the First Amendment principle of separation of church and state.

• Such challenges may lead to legislation to regulate programs like BVA.

• BVA is not a homeschool. (Homeschooling parents take direct responsibility for their children’s educations and do not turn them over to the public schools.) However, because BVA is a public school at home and some people falsely assume it is a homeschool, legislation to increase regulation of BVA may also increase regulation of homeschools.

• BUT, as a homeschooler, there is much you can do to join others working together through WPA to maintain our homeschooling freedoms. See “What We Can Do” below.

Summary: To maintain our homeschooling freedoms, it is important for us Wisconsin homeschoolers to understand and act according to some key principles. It’s a good idea to review these from time to time and especially now because WPA disagrees strongly with parts of a message posted on September 16, 2011 on the Web site of the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA). (See “HSLDA Responds to Criticism on Statement of Enrollment Issue” at www.hslda.org.) It would be irresponsible of WPA not to respond.

Dear WPA Members and Other Homeschoolers,

Please share this with other homeschoolers.
Wisconsin families continue to act wisely and courageously. WPA continues to give them important information and strong support and to work along with them. As a result, situations that could have weakened homeschooling have been turned around and instead have strengthened homeschooling. Here are a few recent examples.

In brief (details below):
Example 1: Homeschool diplomas are now being officially recognized and treated like other diplomas by the Wisconsin Department of Justice (DOJ).
Example 2: WPA educated Fox Valley Technical College about homeschool diplomas and convinced them to accept a homeschool diploma they had rejected. This allowed the student to receive a federal student loan that had been approved and then withheld by the college.

Example 3: A local school district with a long history of opposing homeschooling has just agreed not to charge homeschoolers with truancy when they are not enrolled in a conventional school and file their PI-1206 forms after the third Friday in September and before October 15th.