Home Schooling and Religious Freedom

Document Type

Opinion

Publication Title

EducationWeek

Publication Date

10-20-2004

Abstract

(Excerpt)

Home-schooling requirements vary widely in scope, detail, and source. A number of states have relaxed their regulations in response to political pressure strengthened by reports that home-schooled students as a group excel academically and gain entrance into prestigious colleges. Ten states, including New Jersey and Texas, do not even require parents to notify school officials that they are home-schooling their children. Most of these states require no record keeping. Fourteen states, including Alabama, California, Wisconsin, and the District of Columbia, require little beyond notification. Others, such as New York, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania, require standardized testing, curricular approval, and diversely defined teacher qualifications. Requirements appear in a variety of legal sources, including state statutes, state education department regulations and policy statements, and whatever gloss local school districts may add. All these are subject to court interpretation.

Litigation challenging state regulation has been lively. Parents typically assert violations of 14th Amendment due-process rights to liberty or privacy or First Amendment religious rights under the federal Constitution. The results have been mixed. While the Supreme Court has ruled that parental rights are a “fundamental” liberty interest, which would trigger more exacting judicial scrutiny, it has yet to apply the rule to education. A 1990 court decision holding that generally applicable laws that burden religion need only be constitutionally “reasonable” likewise weakened religious claims. In response, state legislatures have given parents in Kansas, Michigan, and Texas the protection of laws affirming the “fundamental right” of parents to direct their children’s upbringing.

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