Woodbury teen (un) schooled in ways of the world REPUBLICAN-AMERICAN
BY MATT JOHNSON

“I really got a sense of being a self-learner,” he said. “When you’re unschooled, you never stop learning just because you leave the classroom. I know how to seek the information that I want, and that’s huge in college.”

But while he was able to gain a solid fundamental knowledge of English and science, as he spent time with friends he began to realize that there were gaps in his education — such as higher math.

“I was hanging out with my friends, and they were talking about something that had to do with math and I had no idea what they were saying,” he said. “I started working harder to keep up with them.”

Berkowitz said his passion for information technology and the desire to keep up with his friends pushed him to dive into math more seriously than he had. He developed his own curriculum for learning algebra, but found that teaching himself more complicated concepts like geometry were beyond his means.

That realization drove him to a place he had never before stepped foot in — a classroom.

The article specifically asks for comments regarding unschooling:

What do you think of unschooling? Do you think it can work with the right child? Share your comments using the form below.

ht to Judy Aron of NHELD

There’s a bait-and-switch scam going on in the General Assembly where the homeschooling bill 162 is concerned.

Originally proposed by Rep. Arthur O’Neill, it’s supposed to clarify a legal hitch causing problems for Connecticut parents who homeschool.

Here’s the deal: when parents withdraw their children from school to teach them at home, the schools have been calling the Department of Children and Families and reporting the parents for “educational neglect.”

…

Deborah Stevenson, an attorney who heads NHELD (National Home Education Legal Defense), finds this unacceptable. “It’s not enough to accept the letter, you must consider the child withdrawn,” she argues. “Evidence is not proof.”

Besides, acceptance of the letters isn’t really the problem: “School districts were accepting them, but not considering the children withdrawn, then calling DCF and charging them with educational neglect.”

Ridgefield homeschoolers tell of trials, 30 March 2008, Ridgefield Press, Ridgefield, Connecticut

Attorney Deborah Stevenson, an education lawyer in Southbury and the executive director of National Home Education Legal Defense, told the legislature that public schools around the state had been reporting families to the Department of Children and Family after the withdrawal of children from the public schools for homeschooling.

“The bill … is needed because of the improper, coercive, and abusive actions of school officials who falsely reported, or threatened to report, more than 40 families to the Department of Children and Families in this past year alone, simply because they exercised their right to refuse unlawful demands of public school officials, and withdrew their children from the public school system…

The bill would compel school districts to unconditionally acknowledge and respect the right of parents when they exercise their right to withdraw their children from a public school, she wrote.

…

A lawyer with the State Department of Education offered a different perspective on the controversy.

We’ve got a number of different statutes that relate to home instruction, said Attorney Laura Anastacio. But essentially what we have are dual obligations. Parents have certain statutory obligations and school districts have certain statutory obligations.

Local boards of education are required to make certain that children who reside within their school districts are attending public school, or they have to contact the parent and make sure that the child is receiving equivalent instruction elsewhere.

School personnel are also “mandatory reporters under state child protection statues: They are required to report suspected cases of abuse  not just beatings, but all kinds, including the “educational abuse” of not providing a child with adequate schooling.

They have to report cases of possible educational neglect, if a child isn’t being educated. Ms. Anastasio said.

A problem with what the lawyer for the State Department of Education says is that the schools are equating home education with educational neglect. There is no indication in this report that the schools have any reason to suspect neglect except that the parents have withdrawn the children. Sounds as if bullying has left the playground and is now in the schools’ offices.

Links to reports about the current state of affairs in Connecticut are at NHELD’s Connecticut page.

Deborah Stevenson, an education attorney who represents Hughes, said her family is one of more than 40 in the past year who found DCF investigators at their doorsteps statewide after removing children from their local district to be home schooled.

School districts often notify DCF after children are removed, she said.

“In all of the cases DCF has found the complaints unsubstantiated because parents have the right to remove their children,” Stevenson said.

…

State Rep. Arthur O’Neill, R-Southbury, a supporter of home schooling, urged lawmakers on the Legislature’s Select Committee on Children to hold a public hearing on a bill to address the matter.

The legislation would require school districts to accept a student’s withdrawal immediately upon receiving a registered letter from the parents.

“The purpose is to streamline and simplify the process,” O’Neill said. “Currently the process is different in every district.”

The lawmaker added that the only state law on the matter is a statute that has changed little since its inception in the 1680s.

…

The new legislation, Senate Bill 162, was voted on favorably by the committee and moved forward to the Education Committee for further action.

Stevenson said state Sen. Thomas Gaffey, D-Meriden, chairman of the committee, has refused to hold public hearings on similar legislation proposed in recent years — essentially preventing the bill from moving forward for consideration by the legislature.

Commentary from Consent of the Governed: CT – SB162 – Education Committee To Place Withdrawal Bill On Their Agenda

If the bill is not placed on the agenda before March 19, 2008, it “dies” in committee and there will be no vote on it on the floor of the House or Senate.

Therefore, we are asking anyone who can attend the Education Committee meetings [for a vote at its meeting either on Monday, March 17, 2008 or Tuesday, March 18, 2008], to please do so. You will not have an opportunity to speak – but your presence will speak for you.

posted by Valerie

Home-schooling advocates will be watching with interest when legislators hold a public hearing Tuesday on a bill that would change the way parents withdraw their children from public school.

The proposed law would require parents to send a certified letter informing their local school superintendent of their decision, and would mandate that the school board immediately “deem the child withdrawn from school.”

State statutes do not specify how children under 16 are withdrawn from a public school.

Home-School Support, 20 February 2008, Hartford Courant, Hartford, Connecticut

For the past two years, Formichella said she has hidden in her house, shouting through the door when people knock because she fears the person on the other side might be a state social worker coming to take her children away.

…

Within weeks of pulling her children from the public school system in 2006, Formichella received a letter from the local school superintendent requiring her to sign a form and submit more evidence that her children were being properly schooled. If she didn’t, Formichella said, she would risk a neglect investigation by the state Department of Children and Families. Formichella was frightened at first, then incensed.

“That’s a heinous, heinous thing to threaten a parent,” Formichella said outside the hearing room Tuesday. “And [the school superintendent] knew me!”

Commentary on the legislation from the Connecticut blog, Consent of the Governed.

• CT Parental Rights: School withdrawal bill hearing makes the news (includes link to public hearing video)
• More on the school withdrawal bill (commentary on the P.R. surrounding the bill)
• Withdrawal bill news links (links to news reports)

posted by Valerie

Hoo Ya! A Victory For A Military Homeschool Family in CT!, 6 July 2007, Consent of the Governed

The DCF Commissioner, Susan Hamilton, send a certified letter to Isabelle Hall-Gustafsen, whose husband had been deployed, saying that DCF has reviewed her file and has decided to reverse their substantiation of the school’s claims of truancy and medical neglect. So the case is now unsubstantiated and the family can breathe a little easier. The news came at the time when SSGT Robert Gustafson, Jr (643rd MP ) returned home from deployment on July 3rd. (I am certain they had a very happy 4th of July!).

Additionally, Commissioner Hamilton has promised to get back to us with plans of implementing the policy changes that NHELD has recommended in order to avoid these types of investigations brought on by false reports by school administrators.

posted by Valerie

Governor’s office calls a meeting regarding DCF abuses of homeschooling families in Connecticut, 12 June 2007, Consent of the Governed

Also at the press conference were three families who told their stories to the press about having been improperly reported to DCF. The families told their stories in heart rendering simplicity, detailing the abuses of the public school system in falsely labeling their children as truant and in falsely alleging the parents as educationally neglectful. The parents were representative of the reasons why the legislation is necessary.

The press conference can be viewed online on the CT-N web site. [note: 35 minutes]

The entire press release is available at Consent of the Governed.

posted by Valerie

31 May 2007: Homeschoolers under attack by Department of Children and Families (DCF) in Connecticut

Parents who have had it with the school system and then attempt to withdraw their children – even after filing Notice of Intent forms or writing a letter to withdraw their children from school, are being reported to DCF on trumped up charges of educational neglect as well as other claims in order to prevent them from homeschooling.

2 June 2007: CT legislators attempt to help homeschoolers

The following State Representatives attempted to offer up an amendment to help homeschoolers with the withdrawal issue and subsequent DCF problems on May 31, by offering up an amendment on SB 1094 An Act Concerning School Bullying.

5 June 2007: Press conference regarding DCF abuses scheduled for June 6 — sponsored by NHELD

You will hear from Isabelle Hall-Gustafson, whose husband is on military deployment overseas. She is a mother who was reported by her school district to DCF for educational and medical neglect after the school, itself, chose to ignore doctors’ notes and a medical plan for the child, only to call the child truant and the mother neglectful. You’ll also hear from another mother, Christine Canfield, who provided doctors’ notes for absences for her daughter, only to be told that wasn’t good enough, that she had to sign medical releases so the school could know more and talk privately to the child’s doctors. When that Mom said, “No,” the public school reported her to DCF, and DCF substantiated her for neglect. Other parents will talk about their experiences as well

A local television station picked up the news:

Parents: Home-School Laws Need Change, 6 June 2007, Eyewitness News, WFSB, Hartford, Connecticut

Video

Channel 3 Eyewitness News reporter Irene O’Connor reported the law is pretty clear in Connecticut: Parents have to educate their children. But there’s no clear criteria for what parents have to do for home-schooling.

“The recommendation is that you file a notice of intent to withdraw your child from school, it’s very vague and the state Department of Education has interpreted it many different ways,” Christine Canfield said.

Update:

Connecticut Network, Media on Demand: CNB on State Home Schooling Policies

dial-up warning: 36-minute video, please allow for download time

note at site: “DISCLAIMER: Please note, due to server space limitations, CT-N.com cannot guarantee that all programming will be made available as On-demand files. Additionally, this means that On-demand files will only remain available for a finite duration.”

I presume that a “finite duration” translates to a “short time.”

posted by Valerie

CT Pandemic Legislation – Is It Anti-Homeschool?

Neither rain or snow or pandemic, no matter what emergency arises you must still “do school” as the administrators demand it to be done. Seems to me they don’t want parents to make their own educational choices in a crisis, but instead will promote doing government school at home, or some other remote location. I think logging into some remote site in order for junior to complete worksheets and “word-finds” might be somewhat low on people’s “to do” list when they are fighting for survival. Also, do they honestly think people will have electricity to get their lessons on the Internet or cable TV?

posted by Valerie

Freak Power: Ned Vare reflects on a special time in American politics and culture, 8 May 2007, Clinton Recorder, Guilford, Connecticut

Though it cast a big shadow, Aspen was a small town in the 1970s. The resort town in the Colorado Rockies also was a haven for free spirits, including the late Hunter S. Thompson, the “gonzo journalist” who ran for sheriff on the so-called “Freak Power” ticket. On that same party ticket was a young man named Ned Vare. …

Thompson and Vare shared an office and became friends when Thompson (who was eventually immortalized as “Uncle Duke” – the character in the Doonesbury cartoon) played volleyball one Sunday afternoon at Woody Creek. Vare said Thompson’s banter – and Denver Bronco games – opened his eyes about conventional wisdom. “These people didn’t believe anybody,” he said. “They helped to peel away all the bull. I got to meet a lot of people (in Aspen) and I read the paper and meet the people doing things,” Vare said.

I’m saddened to see that Ned is ill, and I hope ‘modern medicine’ is doing its best for him.

He wrote his first two books on golf 10 years ago, but his main passion is children and how the public schools and formal education aren’t doing the job. A deadly pulmonary disease has kept him from the links recently, but he still travels to homeschooling affirs where he and his wife, Luz Shosie speak. He has appeared 20 times on public access television on the subject and writes books, magazine articels and newspaper columns.

Pulmonary fibrosis, which led to Marlon Brando’s death at 80, makes Vare’s days short.

“I’m not getting any better, baby,” he said. “This thing just kills people.”

1970s-era photo is at The Great Thompson Hunt.

Thanks for all your old NHEN-Leg posts, Ned.

posted by Valerie