Real Deadlines, and Not-so-real Deadlines
    This is the time of year when the public school and most home schools are wrapping up the school year and making arrangements for the end of year academic assessment. Many home schoolers will receive letters from the superintendent’s office requesting that they turn in their academic assessment results at the close of the 1998–99 school year, namely, the end of June or early July.
    Those new to home schooling should be aware that such deadlines are not in Ohio’s home school regulations, nor can they be enforced. The end of year academic assessment is to be submitted along with the notification for the following year. Again, there is no notification deadline—however, once public school begins, either the student needs to be in school or the parents need to have submitted a notification. Essentially, the deadline is the first day of school.
    What should members do if they receive a letter requesting that they submit the assessment by June 30 or some other date? As a practical matter for many home schoolers, the standardized test results will not have come back from scoring with the publisher, so even if they wanted to, they could not meet that deadline. Home School Legal Defense Association recommends that parents reply by letter to the superintendent’s office, indicating that the regulations require the assessment to be submitted with the notification at the beginning of the next school year. If members receive a particularly heavy-handed response from the superintendent on this issue, they should contact our office and HSLDA will send a letter to the superintendent on their behalf.