School Choice & Charters

Va. Plan Would Ease Standards For Home School Parents

By Mary Ann Zehr — May 05, 2004 4 min read
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

Gov. Mark R. Warner of Virginia has several weeks to decide if he will sign a bill that would make it easier for parents in the state with only a high school diploma to home school their children.

Advocates of home schooling say that Virginia has the most stringent qualifications of any state for parents to teach their children at home—and that the requirements should be eased to enable a broader range of parents to do so.

But Belle S. Wheelan, Virginia’s secretary of education, has asked Gov. Warner, a Democrat, not to sign the bill. She argues it would inappropriately remove input from local school districts in the home schooling of children whose parents don’t have college degrees.

Current law automatically permits parents who have bachelor’s degrees or who are certified to be teachers in Virginia to teach their children at home.

Parents who have just high school diplomas may also home school their children, but such parents must meet one of two additional criteria: They must either teach their children through a correspondence course that has been approved by the state, or have their children’s curriculum approved by the local district’s superintendent.

The home schooling bill on the desk of Gov. Warner would alter the law so that parents could automatically teach their children at home—without having the curriculum preapproved—as long as they had at least a high school diploma.

The curriculum requirement for home schooling parents without college degrees has erected an unnecessary barrier, argued Joe Guarino, a part- time lobbyist for the Richmond, Va.-based Home Educators Association of Virginia, which first proposed the bill to Virginia legislators. The legislation was sponsored by state Delegate Robert B. Bell, a Republican.

While some school officials have readily approved the curricula that home schooling parents without college degrees have proposed, other school officials have created hassles for them, Mr. Guarino said.

Above Average

Chris Klicka, the senior counsel for the Home School Legal Defense Association, a national group based in Purcellville, Va., said his organization has played a role in getting states to relax qualifications for parents to teach their own children. In part, the organization has done so by filing and winning lawsuits regarding the qualifications of parents, he said.

Mr. Klicka cites research conducted by home schooling advocates that shows that home-schooled children score, on average, well above the 50th percentile on standardized tests. “If the child is doing above average, what difference do the parents’ qualifications make?” he said.

Forty-one states don’t have any qualifications for parents to teach their children at home, according to Mr. Klicka. Eight of the nine states that do have qualifications require only that parents have a high school diploma or General Educational Development certificate, he said.

Mr. Klicka said that Virginia stands alone in requiring parents to have a college degree or meet one of the other criteria laid out in the law.

Virginia is one of 24 states, however, that require home schoolers to take standardized tests.

The Home School Legal Defense Association urges that states relax any regulations regarding home schooling, including mandatory tests.

“Our position is that we should trust the parents,” said Mr. Klicka. “We are very much in favor of home school laws that operate on an honor system.”

But Ms. Wheelan, the Virginia secretary of education, believes that parents who have only a high school credential should be required to receive some guidance from their school districts or the state. “When you’ve not been to college,” she said, “you need some kind of input from people on what is expected.”

Charles B. Pyle, the director of communications for the Virginia Department of Education, said that the tremendous growth in the number of home-schooled students in Virginia shows that the state has not been overrestrictive in regulating that area of education.

Since 1990, he said, the number of home-schooled children in the state has increased about sixfold, from 2,944 to 18,102. The state has 1.2 million children enrolled in public schools, he said.

After the home schooling bill was approved by the Virginia legislature, Gov. Warner asked lawmakers to amend it by requiring parents with only a high school diploma to score a certain level on a standardized test before they would be permitted to teach their children at home.

The legislature rejected that amendment on April 21. By law, Mr. Warner has 30 days from that date to decide whether to sign the bill.

The Virginia Education Association opposed the home schooling bill during legislative debate, but doesn’t intend to lobby Gov. Warner to veto it, said Jean H. Bankos, the president of the state affiliate of the National Education Association.

She added that parents in Virginia can get around home schooling laws by requesting a religious exemption from compulsory schooling.

The state granted 5,628 of the exemptions in the current school year, Mr. Pyle said.

Events

This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Reading & Literacy Webinar
(Re)Focus on Dyslexia: Moving Beyond Diagnosis & Toward Transformation
Move beyond dyslexia diagnoses & focus on effective literacy instruction for ALL students. Join us to learn research-based strategies that benefit learners in PreK-8.
Content provided by EPS Learning
Classroom Technology Live Online Discussion A Seat at the Table: Is AI Out to Take Your Job or Help You Do It Better?
With all of the uncertainty K-12 educators have around what AI means might mean for the future, how can the field best prepare young people for an AI-powered future?
Special Education K-12 Essentials Forum Understanding Learning Differences
Join this free virtual event for insights that will help educators better understand and support students with learning differences.

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

School Choice & Charters Explainer How States Use Tax Credits to Fund Private School Choice: An Explainer
Twenty-one states have programs that give tax credits for donations to organizations that grant private-school scholarships.
12 min read
budget school funding
iStock/Getty
School Choice & Charters Private School Choice in the 2024 Election, Explained
Three states will ask voters to weigh in on private school choice, and another state could pave the way for more funding for choice.
7 min read
3D illustration of a character walking on the road leading to many different paths with open doors. The pathway and doors are light in color against a dark blue backgroud.
iStock/Getty
School Choice & Charters How Private School Choice Complicates Public School Budgets
Districts are seeing higher costs and fuzzier enrollment projections as more states give parents public funds for private education.
12 min read
Illustration of a person holding a bag of money with a hole in it, where coins are falling out, with a chart behind showing loss.
iStock/Getty
School Choice & Charters A Private School Choice Program Is Illegal, State Court Rules. What Comes Next?
South Carolina's education savings account program is no more.
4 min read
Pictogram chalk drawing of a blue man holding scales.
iStock/Getty