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Colorado
Impact of S.B. 186
As reported in the May/June Court Report, Governor Owens signed into law Senate Bill 186, allowing home school families to file their annual notice and 3rd, 5th, 7th, and 11th grade assessments in any district in Colorado. (Parents may file the assessments with a private or parochial school instead, but must inform the district in which they filed their notice of intent.)
Other details of S.B. 186 will only affect some families, as follows:
Only the school district the parents choose can request an inspection of the parent’s permanent home school records. As before, the district may inspect these records only if there is probable cause to believe the family is in violation of the home school law, and parents must be given 14 days notice.
The new law also entitles home schooled students to participate on an equal basis with public schooled students in extracurricular and interscholastic activities in the district where the notice was filed. All students are subject to the same rules, but special rules apply if a student withdraws from a government school to start a home school program more than 15 days after a school year starts.
The new law requires parental consent to play a role in determining the grade level to which a child is assigned if a home schooled child is placed in a government school. It also requires the government school to “accept the transcripts” from the home school program. Any school district in which a home schooled child attends part-time (not just the school district where the child resides) will now be eligible to count that student as part of its enrollment for purposes of state funding.
Special thanks to Treon Goossen of Concerned Parents of Colorado, who spent many hours attending committee meetings watching for any attempt to amend S.B. 186 in a way that would hurt home schoolers. — Scott A. Woodruff
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