Should Home-School Students Play on Local HS Teams? (Virginia Beach: public schools, law)

[Alltheusernamesaretaken]

Originally Posted by sullyguy

And home-schooled kids miss out on ALL of it. Hours and hours per school day of it.

This could apply to
bullying,
teaching-to-the-test,
excessive non-academic focus,
excessive liberal studies,
crazy "new math,"
and so on and so forth
as well.

[OrangeFish]

Originally Posted by newgatedenizen

At the elementary school level I think we were able to do as good or better job than FCPS - at the lower grade levels at least... particularly in the subject of science - FCPS imo is very weak in elementary school science instruction/program.

I read an article recently that named Virginia one of the better states in terms of the science curriculum. Personally I was taken quite a bit aback at that measure. I have tried to offer extra science at home after school, but there are only so many hours, kids need breaks, etc.

The State of Science Standards: Virginia

[Yankeesfan]

Originally Posted by sullyguy

And home-schooled kids miss out on ALL of it. Hours and hours per school day of it.

Indeed.

Like my friend who chose to home-school because her daughter was being continually ridiculed due to her Asperger's Syndrome.

Or my friend who chose to home-school because her gorgeous daughter developed VERY early and was constantly leered at and hit upon by boys much older than her at her grade 7-12 (all in one building) school.

Or my relative who chose to home-school because her daughter had a serious chronic medical problem that she felt wasn't being well-managed at school.

Or my friend who wanted to home-school (but couldn't quit her job) because the school never notified her until report cards came out that her son had skipped school for six weeks (which, it turned out, he had done because he was being threatened by a gang, including having a knife pulled on him).

Yep, they're missing out on hours and hours of this stuff.

And we can tell by Sullyguy's polite and welcoming demeanor toward those who choose a different option than his, that he was SO excellently socialized in school .

I've never home-schooled and don't intend to, so I have no personal stake in this issue. And I'm not anti-public schools, either. Education is so crucial that we should be united in wanting children to do well, no matter what type of schooling -- public, private, home -- they're using. But it's really a question of fairness. Sad how many people want to deny opportunities to kids who are their neighbors.

[tgbwc]

Originally Posted by OrangeFish

I read an article recently that named Virginia one of the better states in terms of the science curriculum. Personally I was taken quite a bit aback at that measure. I have tried to offer extra science at home after school, but there are only so many hours, kids need breaks, etc.

The State of Science Standards: Virginia

At the elementary level I'm finding that science and social studies are both going the way of our health lessons. They're covered if there is enough time. Since they count towards our AYP, reading and math (taught as isolated subjects) are taking up a lot of the time that we used to spend on science and ss. According to my wife, the grade level prior to hers doesn't spend much time at all on science since it isn't SOL tested that year.

[sullyguy]

Originally Posted by Yankeesfan

Like my friend

You DO understand, right, that all the examples you cite as lame excuses for denying kids a REAL education are WAY out there on the cusp of the curve, thus meaningless?

Home-schooling is fantastic for providing a one-on-one opportunity to learn reading, writing, and arithmetic - no doubt about that - though that's just an opportunity, not necessarily a given. And as the sad replies to the obvious show, it appears to be a great way to hide the real world from kids as well.

And it, of course, necessarily denies hours per day of social learning from kids.

Just as I would not try to stop someone from practicing their particular choice in religion so, too, would I not try to stop someone from denying their kids a real education by keeping them home rather than experiencing the world; there are limits to society trying to get involved in a family's affairs, IMHO; people SHOULD be free to make mistakes, even cross-generational mistakes.

But when someone gets on a public message board (rather than, say, a feel-good home-school oriented message board) and attempts to suggest that home-schooling is better or even equivalent to public/private group schooling, I readily admit a need to say "No."

[Bideshi]

Originally Posted by kevinm

If I pay taxes to support the public schools then my kids should be allowed to compete for the slots on the sports teams of the schools they would have been attending anyway.

Yup. Same here.

[Yankeesfan]

Originally Posted by sullyguy

You DO understand, right, that all the examples you cite as lame excuses for denying kids a REAL education are WAY out there on the cusp of the curve, thus meaningless?

So if your daughter who goes to Westfield High School was being ridiculed, sexually harassed, endangered with regard to her health, or threatened with a knife in the school building, you would celebrate it as "social learning"? Sad. (Two of the examples I cited were FCPS students, two were from other states.)

I'm not even arguing that home-schooling is inherently superior. Most of the kids and young adults I know are thriving, or thrived, in their public schools. So are most kids I know who are (or were) home-schooled. Many parents who home-school choose to do so for positive reasons, not just as a reaction to bad experiences. I cited the examples above to puncture your blanket claim that public schooling is inherently superior for every child. That is the problem with your arguments here: you are making generalizations about how good public schooling always is for every child, and how bad home-schooling always is for every child. I would feel the same toward people who make blanket condemnations of public schooling.

Even within the public school system, many parents decide to send their child to a school other than their neighborhood school. GT, language immersion, language instruction, magnet programs, AP, IB, child care availability, etc. Is anyone disrespecting that? Hopefully not. (Which makes it interesting when people claim that homeschool students who live in the neighborhood undercut the neighborhood unity, but don't apply the same standard to students who attend a school other than the one in their neighborhood.)

Why not just respect parents' choices instead of automatically being derogatory toward one group or another? That's what parents generally do; they have no problem with their friends who choose a different option for their children, or with their children's friends who are in a different school setting. We have posters on this board who are heavily invested in all the different schooling options, who are open-minded in discussions, or who have an opinion but make their case in a way that isn't automatically negative toward others. Same with parents in our neighborhoods.

[JD984]

I'm not sure why this thread needs to become a referendum on home-schooling in NoVa. Home-schooling is an option in NoVa; it is clearly the best solution for some students; and it appears that home-schooled students already have ways - at least in Fairfax - to compete on athletic teams against other teams of students who are not in the public schools. As to whether home-schooled students should be allowed to compete on teams that purport to represent local public schools that they don't attend, I'm trying to withhold judgment until more facts are available. It's not an issue that affects me directly; my kids have been on some HS sports teams where there wasn't the type of competition to make the team that arises, say, to land a spot on the Stone Bridge football team or the Madison baseball team. Viscerally, it feels analogous to situations where athletes are awarded citizenship shortly before the Olympics and then compete for a country where they haven't lived or grown up.

I think that what Michgc may have been puzzling over, in playing devil's advocate a few posts back, was what types of decisions either promote or detract from a sense of community. In a small town, where everyone knows each other, allowing the home-schooled kid to play on the local public school team may reinforce the town's sense of community. In a big suburb, where school districts may be randomly drawn and pull in kids who live in many different areas, allowing a home-schooled kid to play on his or her assigned public school's team potentially might have the opposite effect on the school-based community. I find the argument "because I pay taxes, I/my kids deserve [whatever]" to be too simple. It rarely works out exactly that way.

Rather than have a state legislature that seems to enjoy taking pot shots at public institutions mandate what local school districts should do, I personally would prefer it if the legislature expressly left it up to each school district to make such decisions (and far enough in advance that VHSL could make any necessary adjustments to districts, schedules, etc.). Home-schoolers often make the decision to home school because they don't like the "one size fits all" approach that may exist in the public schools. That seems to be the exact approach, however, that the legislators seem to want to require here.

[Alltheusernamesaretaken]

Originally Posted by Yankeesfan

And we can tell by Sullyguy's polite and welcoming demeanor toward those who choose a different option than his, that he was SO excellently socialized in school .

Sad how many people want to deny opportunities to kids who are their neighbors.

You have to realize that, as is always evident on C-D forums,
"tolerance" is only OK coming from one direction.

[Yankeesfan]

I read this on a blog written by a Virginia home-school parent:

"giving thanks for public school friends who take the time to write letters in favor of the Tebow bill. Even more, I'm grateful that they've taken the time to assure me--despite the ugly noise to the contrary--that we are welcome and they don't see the polarizing divisions being propogated by teacher's unions and PTAs."