WISCONSIN
Unfriendly to Home Schoolers
For the first time in many years, Wisconsin home school liberties were facing attack. Senate Bill 106, introduced by Senators Roger Breske and Timothy Weeden, prohibits parents form home schooling simply because their child previously had a truancy problem or was found "in need of services."
S.B. 106 directly assaults parents' rights by penalizing sincere parents who want to resolve their children's truancy problems through home schooling. Families who could most benefit from this alternative would be permanently ineligible to home school. Breske's concern that real truants use the home school law as a cover is already dealt with under the present home school law that prohibits it from being used to "circumvent the truancy law."
As HSLDA and Wisconsin home schoolers began to strategize, God had already perfectly planned the timing. First, HSLDA Attorney Scott Somerville sent out a "legislative alert" to all Wisconsin members. The Wisconsin Christian Home Educators Association (CHEA) annual conference just "happened" to be scheduled for the weekend prior to the April 9 hearing on S.B. 106. And HSLDA Senior Counsel Christopher Klicka, invited almost a year earlier, was scheduled to speak at that conference and be interviewed on several local television and radio programs. As a result, he informed over 1,200 home schoolers at the convention about the bill, asked for a show of hands to commit to call the entire legislature the Monday and Tuesday before the hearing, and urged attendance at the hearing. HSLDA provided legislative alerts and lapel stickers bearing a "canceled" 106 (see sticker at above right) for the CHEA conference and for hearing attendees. Chris Klicka was also able to spread word of this dangerous legislation through his radio and television interviews.
On April 9, home schoolers opposing S.B. 106 packed out the Wisconsin Senate hearing room. An aide to one of the bill's sponsors was visibly impressed by the preprinted flyers and the stickers worn by all the home schoolers. "I'd like to know who their printer is," he confided, "I can't get stuff printed up that fast in this town." When asked if he has heard from anyone in support of the bill, he said "No. I was trying to find some stickers for S.B. 106 but they all had a bright red line through it."
The commitment of the Wisconsin home schoolers was not lost on the aide, either. Although the bill has not been formally withdrawn or pronounced "dead," the sponsor's aide is "skeptical of a favorable report at this time." "Even people on our side of the aisle," mourned the aide, "aren't going to support it. [The sponsor] is not even sure he wants to try to move it forward anymore."
The aide went on to explain that this was the "largest turnout for a hearing he had ever seen!" In fact, he thinks it was the largest "in recent memory." The home schoolers filled the largest senate hearing room, the gallery, and a second hearing room.
Congratulations, Wisconsin, on a job well done! And we praise God for orchestrating a perfect timing of events.
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