Home School Heartbeat Radio Program

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Judging Homeschooling in California
Volume 85, Program 7
9/30/2008

Homeschoolers in California woke up on February 29 of this year to a much more unusual state of affairs than just leap day. HSLDA President Mike Smith and Mike Farris expose the surprise appeals court ruling that started this year’s major battle over homeschooling, on today’s Home School Heartbeat.

Mike Smith:
For our listeners who aren’t familiar with the history of the August 8 California Court of Appeal decision upholding the legality of homeschooling in California, Mike, would you fill them in on what happened February 28?

Mike Farris:
In a case involving one particular family from southern California, the court of appeal in Los Angeles had decided that homeschooling was not legal in California. Now they had relied on two decisions from many years ago, but principally they had relied on a decision from the 1950s, and then secondarily another case—Turner and Shinn are the two case names—from the 1960s.

Based on those two cases, they concluded that you couldn’t homeschool your kids in California, that the private school route was not a valid method of homeschooling, and they didn’t look at any of the things that had happened in the interim.

So the problem was, they relied on 40- and 50-year-old interpretations and not what was going on in California. So it was a disastrous opinion that caused alarm all across the country, but particularly among homeschoolers in California.

Mike Smith:
Well, we’re certainly glad they finally got it right on August 8. And until next time, I’m Mike Smith.

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