State Board of Education Action Alert

>From Manfred Smith
Maryland Home Education Association MHEA

November 3, 2002

Homeschooling in Maryland has been a stable affair for many
years mow. But every so often there is a conflict between local school personnel and homeschoolers. Conflicts often arise when local school officials want to become a little creative with the language of the homeschool bylaw and make up some new requirements that are not part of the regulations. These conflicts are usually resolved by talking with school officials; we have them take a close look at the language of the regulations especially Section F which expressly forbids any local school official from changing, adding or modifying the regulations.

Every few years there is some issue that comes up at the
state level and the way these conflicts have traditionally been handled is by representatives of homeschool groups such as MHEA and MACHE(Maryland Christian Home Educators) being invited to Baltimore to resolve these conflicts. The result of this rational process has been 15 years of
peace.

This tranquil picture changed abruptly recently when the
State Board of Education published their intent to modify the notification portion of the by-law just a few weeks ago. Some of you are aware of that Richard Scott of the State BOE was changing the title of the notification form
from Assurance of Consent to Homeschool Registration.
Some others contacted Mr. Scott and let him know that this
registration smacked of permission and that this was unacceptable to homeschoolers.

Representing MHEA, I contacted Mr. Scott and informed him
that we did not support any changes to the notification form. Experience informs me that ANY change can result in other complexities. Once things get stirred up at regulating agencies, they often get worse. They have.

In mid-October the Alternatives Programs Branch of the State Board of Education decided that changes would be made to the Assurance of Consent form and published its intent in the Maryland Register. The first would be a change in the forms title, from Assurance of Consent to Homeschool
Application. A seconda much more serious changewould
require yearly notification by all homeschoolers. Instead of completing an initial notification form, homeschoolers would now have to notify their county every year.

For MHEA and MACHE (Maryland Christian Home Educators) , the most serious breech was the fact that personnel at the State Board had ignored past tradition by failing to contact us before this matter ever went beyond the planning stage. Before this, the Board would regularly contact us as a matter of professional courtesy allowing all parties
involved to resolve problems. Fortunately Gary Cox of
Walkersville Family Schools was paying attention and spotted the Boards call for a December hearing in the Legislative Review .

Gary quickly called us to action and on Wednesday, October
30, representatives of the major homeschooling groups met in the offices of the head of the Alternative Programs Branch, Lynn Linde. We began by reviewing with Ms. Linde the many years of cooperation between the homeschooling community and the Board. We then let her know about our
surprise and disappointment about reading these proposed
changes in the Legislative Review instead of being notified of any change as has been the tradition for years. Besides being a breech of professional courtesy, this action had caused us to doubt the sincerity of the Boards attitude toward homeschooling.

My goal in this meeting was to communicate to Ms. Linde that MHEA opposed any changes to the regulation. When asked by Gary Cox what prompted these proposed changes, Ms. Linde said that this was simply a routine clarification process that all regulations are subject to every eight years. This did not satisfy any of us and when pressed to what specific problems regarding homeschooling the Board wanted to addreess, Ms. Linde admitted that as far as she knew, 99.9 percent of the homeschoolers in Maryland were doing a fine job.

The bottom line is that some local school officials around
the state simply want homeschoolers to register every year. I informed Ms. Linde that this was unnecessary paperwork for the schools especially since the schools routinely complain that homesdchoolers are taking up a chunk
of their valuable time! Further, I informed Ms. Linde that
if the Board moved forward to implement these changes to the Assurance form, that MHEA would support a legal challenge against the idea of any notification on Constitutional grounds. I pointed out to her that
parents who take their children out public schools and
enroll them in private schools are not required to file any notification to the local Board of Education. To require only homeschoolers to notify is clearly a violation of the equal protection clause of the Constitution.

After all the arguments were made, I again repeated my
assertion that the Board withdraw this proposal. I further added that if clarification must be done, then change the form title to Homeschool Notification which I believe is the least offensive language and most consistent with
the language of the homeschooling regulations which call for notificationwhile I reminded her of the Constitutional
conflict inherent in notification.

Ms. Linde agreed would consider our argument s against the
proposed changes and promised to review the matter with her staff and at least delay the hearing on this matter until after December. This is good news because it will give all of us an opportunity to contact the Board about our opposition to these changes if they proceed.

Contact Information:

Address your comments to the State Board
of Education and mail them to: Lynn Linde, Branch Chief,
Alternative Programs Branch, Maryland State Department of Education, 200
West Baltimore Street, Baltimore,. MD 21201.

Keep your eye on the BWHE email or other homeschool network
lists for updated information. If the Board goes forward with this proposal to change the notification requirements, then we will let you know when and where the public hearing about this issue will be.

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