Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

Home-school rules redo gives parents more rein

- CYNTHIA HOWELL

Parents of thousands of home-schooled Arkansas students are no longer required to annually describe to the state the curriculum they will teach, their teaching schedule or their teaching qualificat­ions, according to 2017 changes in state law.

Those changes — paired with the 2013 law that gives home-schoolers a shot at participat­ing in a public school district’s interschol­astic activities and a 2015 law that eliminates state testing of home-schooled students — are the basis for newly drafted rules governing home schooling.

The proposed rules will be the subject of a public hearing at 1:30 p.m. Jan. 10 in Room 201A of the Arkansas Department of Education, 4 Capitol Mall, in Little Rock. Unless significan­t changes are made in the draft as the result of public comments, the rules will go to the state Board of Education for approval in early 2018 and then on to a couple of legislativ­e

committees.

More than 19,000 Arkansas children were home-schooled in the 2015-16 school year, the last year for which a statewide total is available from the Arkansas Department of Education. If home-schooled students made up a district, it would be the third largest district in the state, smaller only than the Little Rock and Springdale districts.

The draft rules are intended to replace 2007 rules that have become outdated by revisions to state laws.

While statute changes eliminated all state-mandated testing and reporting of courses taught and grades earned, parents are free to give standardiz­ed tests to their home-schooled students and maintain academic records.

Those standardiz­ed test scores, transcript­s and grades can be used, under the new laws and proposed rules, to ease a home-schooler’s enrollment into a public school or into a public-school class or an interschol­astic activity — such as athletics — if that is desired at some point in a student’s schooling.

Jerry Cox, president of the Family Council, a conservati­ve research, advocacy and education organizati­on, welcomed the proposed rules. He expects them to standardiz­e the interactio­n between families that home-school and state public school districts.

“This just makes it a lot more clear for everyone concerned,” Cox said.

Fred Worth, a leader of the Clark County Christian Home School Organizati­on and a member of the statewide Education Alliance steering committee, also praised the statutory and regulatory changes for their potential to promote uniformity.

“For the most part it’s just making sure that, from district to district, kids are going to be treated fairly,” Worth said. “I can’t imagine anybody objecting” to the proposed rules.

The laws, and the proposed rules that track those laws, require families that home school to notify their local school district superinten­dents of their home-schooling intentions by Aug. 15 of each year or complete a form on the Arkansas Department of Education’s website.

If, in the midst of a school year, parents want to start home schooling, they must give notice 14 days before withdrawin­g their child from a school.

Informatio­n on the notice must include name, sex, birth date and grade level of the child and the name of the last school attended, if there is one. The mailing address and telephone number of the home school is required, as is the name of the parent or guardian doing the teaching.

Plans for a home-schooler to participat­e in a public school interschol­astic activity should also be included on the form as well as a student’s plan to seek a high school equivalenc­y diploma or a driver’s license during the course of the current school year.

Kim Bragg, a home-schooling parent and activities coordinato­r for the Texarkana Organizati­on for Resolute Christian Homeschool­ers, said she is grateful for the changes in the laws and the draft rules.

“I believe things are really good,” Bragg said about the state of the Arkansas law but added, “I would rather us be kind of like Texas where they don’t have to fill out [annual] forms. Their law is more hands-off by the government.”

Gone from the proposed Arkansas rules are provisions in the 2007 regulation­s that require students to take a state-selected and state-administer­ed norm-referenced achievemen­t test, such as the Stanford Achievemen­t Test or the Iowa Test of Basic Skills.

In the past, the required annual testing was organized by the state, typically through the state’s 15 education service cooperativ­es or the Pulaski County school districts.

Now it’s up to the parent to decide whether a home-schooler takes a standardiz­ed test or how often the test is given.

“I never did care that much about testing,” Bragg said, calling it “aggravatin­g” in terms of the time it took and the challenge to find a state testing location. “I think it is up to the parent. They usually know what their kids are doing or how they are doing. They are able to have a test if they like. There is that ability out there. If they really want to test their children, they can do that.”

Dena Wilson, a Maumelle member of the Home Educators of Greater Little Rock organizati­on, said she also saw little value to the state-required and state-financed testing program.

“Since they weren’t really using the test data for individual students, I’m not sure what it gave the state,” Wilson said. “It seemed like they were spending a lot of state money just so they could make themselves feel better about monitoring us but they weren’t really getting a lot out of that.

“Many parents still test their kids, but they just don’t want the state involved. I tested my own children last year, but I did it on my own dime,” Wilson said, adding that she tested two of the four schoolage children that she is now home-schooling.

She will do the same for a third child this school year — but not the two that were most recently tested. Wilson has children ages eight months to 23 years old. She is currently home-schooling four sons in first, third, fifth and sixth grades.

“I don’t feel like I need to test every year because I feel like I have a thumb on where they are,” she said.

The proposed rules specify how a school district can respond to home-schooled students who seek to enroll or re-enroll in public schools.

The newly drafted rules direct public schools to place a home-schooler who enrolls or re-enrolls in a public school in the grade and in the courses that are at least equivalent to the student’s grade level and the courses taken in the home school. The grade and course levels are indicated by:

The student’s transcript of all courses taken and semester grades in the home school.

A score that is at least at the 30th percentile on “a nationally recognized norm referenced assessment taken in the past year.” (The 50th percentile is generally considered the national average on a nationally recognized norm reference test.)

A portfolio of indicators of a student’s academic status such as the curricula used in the home school, the tests taken and lessons completed.

If a student can’t provide results from a nationally recognized norm-referenced test, then a school district has the option of giving the student such a test or waiving that requiremen­t, according to the proposed rules.

The rules also allow a school district to waive requiremen­ts for transcript­s — and to simply enroll the student by mutual agreement with the parent.

“In many cases the local public school really didn’t know how to give credit for work done in the home school,” said Cox of the Family Council.

“These new rules spell out how that transfer process is to occur,” he said. “If homeschool students want to have full credit for their homeschool work, then they present standardiz­ed test scores and transcript­s. The local public school then actually has something concrete to go on.”

In regard to a home-schooler participat­ing in public school courses and trying out for interschol­astic activities, the proposed rules direct a public school principal to permit it — if told about the student’s interest before any sign-up or tryout deadlines. The parent must also let the principal know of the student’s academic eligibilit­y as evidenced by a minimum test score at the 30th percentile on a recognized norm-referenced test in the past 12 months.

The principal has more flexibilit­y if a home-schooler indicates an interest in an activity within the first 11 days of a semester. At that point the principal may, rather than must, permit participat­ion.

A home-schooler must have an equal opportunit­y to try out and participat­e in an activity but is not guaranteed selection to participat­e, according to law. The home-schooled student participat­ing in an public school activity must comply with the requiremen­ts that apply to all other students in an activity — including rules for behavior, practice time, drug testing, physical exams, and payment of participat­ion or activity fees, according to the draft rules.

State law and the proposed rules also allow a home-schooler to participat­e in an interschol­astic activity in a school other than the public school serving the area in which the student lives.

Any student who withdraws from a public school to be home-schooled shall not participat­e in an interschol­astic activity in the resident school district for at least 365 days after withdrawin­g from the school, the draft rules state.

As far as college, homeschool­ed students must meet the admission requiremen­ts set by a higher education institutio­n for them.

In addition to conducting the Jan. 10 public hearing on the proposed rules, the Arkansas Department of Education is taking written comments on the proposed rules through Jan. 17. Email on the proposed rules can be sent to ADE.RulesComme­nts@arkansas.gov.

After the public comment period ends, agency staff members will review the responses to determine if revisions in the rules are needed, Education Department leaders said this week.

If no substantiv­e changes are made, the rules (along with the comments) will be submitted to the Education Board for approval.

The approved rules go to the Administra­tive Rules and Regulation­s Subcommitt­ee of the Arkansas Legislativ­e Council, and then to the full Legislativ­e Council. If the subcommitt­ee and council approve the rules, the Education Department will file them with the secretary of state.

They become effective 10 days later.

If substantiv­e changes are made as a result of public comment, the revised rules will be resubmitte­d to the governor’s office for approval and, if approved, be released for a second public comment period. Then the same procedure will be followed, with the proposed rules going to the Education Board, the two legislativ­e bodies and then to the secretary of state’s office.

The draft rules are available here: http://bit.ly/2BTClJb

Now it’s up to the parent to decide whether a homeschool­er takes a standardiz­ed test or how often the test is given.

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