Page 6 - ARUBA TODAY

A6 U.S. NEWS
Monday 29 January 2018

Case of shackled kids revives home-school regulation debate

By C. THOMPSON teaching at home along
Associated Press with standard education. It
Just over a week after Cali- gained wider acceptance
fornia officials found 13 as parents dissatisfied with
malnourished siblings al- their neighborhood schools
legedly held captive and turned to it to customize
apparently not missed by their children's education
schools because they were and nurture family bonds.
being home-schooled, In the absence of federal
home-schooling advo- guidelines, levels of over-
cates say they are bracing sight vary widely by state.
for calls for stricter oversight Alaska and Idaho have vir-
of the practice. tually no regulations, while
The advocates say they New York and Pennsylvania
were horrified by accusa- families must submit annual
tions that the children's par- instruction plans to the dis-
ents kept them shackled in trict, administer standard-
a filthy home in the South- ized tests taken by public
ern California city of Ferris, school students statewide
and some said they support and provide academic
mandatory medical visits or progress reports.
regular academic assess- California treats home
ments of home-schooled In this Friday, Jan. 26, 2018 photo, artist and author Maybeth Morales, left, leads a home school art schools like other private
children. class for her grandchildren as her daughter Chemay Morales-James, right, and son-in-law Shane, schools and requires them
center, watch in Watertown, Conn. Reports that 13 malnourished siblings allegedly held captive
But others contend moves by their parents were home-schooled has others who educate their children at home bracing for to register. Private schools
to step up home-schooling calls for more oversight of the practice, a reaction they say would unfairly punish families. are subject to annual fire
controls in the name of ex- (AP Photo/Jessica Hill) inspections but no agency
posing child abuse earlier regulates or oversees them.
could lead to overregula- glect and Fatalities, don't ing away the freedom of most of their time out and The Massachusetts-based
tion and intrusion that pun- list home-schooling among law-abiding people is not about in their communities. Coalition for Responsible
ishes parents. them. a price our society should "I'm hoping this is one of Home Education lobbies for
"Right now the biggest One California lawmaker pay." those things where it's hot mandatory medical visits
threat is that lawmakers has floated the idea of In Watertown, Connecti- for the moment and then it or academic assessments
might make a decision requiring annual walk- cut, Chemay Morales- dies down," Morales-James that would ensure home-
based on the emotion of throughs of home schools James home-schools her said. schooled children are seen
the moment, rather than by state or county officials 4- and 6-year-old children Disputes over the right level by someone trained to rec-
looking at the empirical ev- because of the case of the because she wasn't com- of home-schooling regu- ognize abuse. Less than
idence," said Scott Wood- 13 siblings and "a number of fortable with her local lation have simmered for half of the U.S. states now
ruff, senior counsel with legislators have expressed school options and says she years as the number of require academic assess-
the Virginia-based Home interest in doing some- worries that "things are go- home-schooled children in ments, the Education Com-
School Legal Defense As- thing," the HomeSchool As- ing to change now." the U.S. skyrocketed from mission of the States said in
sociation. He said national sociation of California said She rejected the notion about 15,000 in the 1970s to a 2015 report on home-
organizations that track in a statement. that home-schooling hurts about 2 million today. school regulations.
risk factors for child abuse, "We can't prevent evil," children's socialization and The practice was first driven "There's no better way to
including the U.S. Commis- the association said, "and said many home-schooled largely by families' prefer- isolate your child if you are
sion to Eliminate Child Ne- trying to prevent it by tak- children, like hers, spend ences to include religious an abusive parent than to
home-school," said Rachel
Activist who helped legalize medical pot dies Coleman, executive direc-
tor of the coalition, which
maintains a database of
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — died in a hospital in the city. of medicinal marijuana for cate of honor last year. home-school abuse cases.
Dennis Peron, an activist Peron was a driving force AIDS patients as the health "The father of medical In recent years, the trend in
who was among the first behind a San Francisco crisis overtook San Francis- marijuana," one supervisor state laws has been toward
people to argue for the ordinance allowing medi- co. The Chronicle said the called him in the meeting. loosening government
benefits of marijuana for cal marijuana — a move epidemic took his partner, "I came to San Francisco oversight of home-school-
AIDS patients and helped that later aided the 1996 Jonathan West, in 1990. to find love and to change ing, said Joseph Murray, a
legalize medical pot in Cal- passage of Proposition 215 San Francisco's Board of Su- the world," Peron said in Vanderbilt University edu-
ifornia, died Saturday at 72. that legalized medical use pervisors recognized Peron, reply. "I found love, only to cation professor who has
The San Francisco Chron- in the entire state. suffering with late-stage lose him through AIDS. We researched home-school-
icle reported that Peron He argued for the benefits lung cancer, with a certifi- changed the world." q ing. q