The following article is a pleasant enough bread & butter article about homeschooling in New York state. The one incongruous note is almost a historical footnote, ‘who started what kind of homeschooling, and when.’
Home schooling on the rise locally, 15 June 2007, Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, Rochester, New York
Those reasons offer a glimpse into why close to 1,700 students are home schooled in Monroe County — and why the practice is growing both locally and nationally.
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Home schooling was the norm when the United States was founded but died out when public schools were founded and lawmakers made at least some formal education a requirement, said Ian Slatter, director of media relations for the Virginia-based Home School Legal Defense Association. The practice began to re-emerge in the 1960s with the rise of the hippie movement and continued to gain momentum as prayer in public schools was challenged.
“This sparked the evangelicals,” Slatter said, and by the 1980s, more and more people were trying home schooling.
School prayer may have sparked part of the boom in homeschooling, but that isn’t the full story. A less pleasant part was the Supreme Court removal of tax-exempt status from schools that refused entry to black children.
The Burger Court 1969 – 1986, History of the Court, The Supreme Court Historical Society
When the Internal Revenue Service declared in 1970 that private schools discriminating against blacks could no longer claim tax-exempt status, the action went largely unnoticed by the public. In 1983, it became prime-time news when two religious schools having admission policies based on race sought to regain tax-favored status and the case reached the Supreme Court.
Counsel for Bob Jones University and Goldsboro Christian School argued that their policies were based on sincerely held religious beliefs. But the Court ruled that the First Amendment did not prevent denial of tax-favored status. Eliminating racial discrimination in education substantially outweighed any burden placed on the free exercise of religion, according to the eight-to-one majority.
Christian Fundamentalism in the United States, page 469, Fundamentalisms and Society: Reclaiming the Sciences, the Family and Education
While Christian schools were allowed to ignore questions of cultural pluralism in their curriculum, they were not allowed to avoid integration and still maintain their tax-exempt status. … In May 1983, the Supreme Court upheld the denial of tax-exempt status to segregationist schools. The decision based on the case of Bob Jones University … struck a blow to the evangelical right.
With the loss of tax-exempt status underscored by the Supreme Court, it is probable that many schools had to raise their tuition rates. It is also possible that they went out of business if they chose not to integrate. For parents who could not afford the tuition rate increase, did not want their children in an integrated setting, or whose schools closed, the educational choice was between public school and homeschooling.
A Brief History of American Homeschooling, Excerpted from Homeschoolers’ Success Stories: 15 Adults and 12 Young People Share the Impact That Homeschooling Has Made on Their Lives by Linda Dobson
In the 1980s, changes in the tax regulations for Christian schools forced the smaller among them to close down by the hundreds. Suddenly, the parents of the students attending these schools were faced with a choice between government school attendance and homeschooling. For many, this really wasn’t a choice at all, and these Christian families became part of a large second wave of homeschooling, joining earlier homeschoolers and boosting the numbers to record highs. Christian curriculum providers, already well-established businesses that had just lost a large chunk of their original market, followed the money and easily courted the new market of homeschooling parents.
Many apparently chose homeschooling.
posted by Valerie