| From the HSLDA E-lert Service: |
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| Date: From: Subject: | 9/18/2002 12:23:53 PM Home School Legal Defense Association Louisiana-Officials Want to "Tighten Up" on Homeschools |
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---------------------------------------------------------------------- From the HSLDA E-lert Service... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- September 18, 2002 Dear HSLDA Members and Friends, On August 13 2002, three Louisiana legislators met with several child welfare and attendance officers and a Christian Home Educators Fellowship (CHEF) of Louisiana representative. Beryl Amedee, wife of CHEF of LA President John Amedee, represented CHEF at the meeting. Mrs. Amedee attended the meeting expecting to offer constructive suggestions for improving Louisiana's truancy laws. Instead, she was told the meeting was dedicated to announcing the intent to "tighten up" on homeschools in Louisiana. After the meeting, these legislators wrote to Cecil Picard, Superintendent of the Louisiana Department of Education. Their letter states, "We are interested in filing bills for the 2003 Regular Session to tighten up on the requirements for home study and home schooling." The legislature will begin its session on March 31, 2003. This gives us five months to get organized and block this legislation. Visit the link below to read the letter. http://www.hslda.org/hs/state/LA/letter_to_picard.pdf REQUESTED ACTION PRAY. Homeschoolers across America have defeated many legislative proposals over the last ten years, because God has been gracious to us. We urge every believing family to pray that God will deliver us once again. ORGANIZE. Please pass this e-lert on to other families you know, and urge them to join HSLDA and/or sign up for HSLDA's free e-lerts on our website. http://www.hslda.org/elert/default.asp CONTACT YOUR ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES. Please find your state representative and senator by typing in your zip code on HSLDA's legislative toolbox. http://www.hslda.org/toolbox Review the letter that has gone to the State Superintendent of Education carefully, then call your representative and senator and ask them to oppose any additional restrictions on homeschoolers. Be sure to ask them whether they support homeschool freedom. Please e- mail HSLDA with any information you receive concerning the position of your legislators. We will compile a list of which legislators support homeschooling and which ones are willing to regulate it. BACKGROUND CHEF's Beryl Amedee attended the meeting between the legislators and truant officers, but was not able to persuade the other attendees to drop the idea of regulating homeschoolers. She soon learned that they did not want ideas on how to prevent dropouts, which was the original purpose for the meeting. Rather the agenda was solely to declare a plan to introduce legislation to further regulate homeschoolers. Some of the possibilities suggested were: > Give the power to oversee homeschoolers to the local school districts instead of the state DOE. > Make yearly testing of all homeschoolers mandatory, and the passing of tests a criteria for approval to continue homeschooling. > Charge the homeschool family an annual registration fee of $35 or $150 per year so that the state or local school districts would have enough money to effectively regulate the homeschoolers. > Require that parents who wish to homeschool must have a minimum of a high school diploma or GED before they can begin. > Require that if homeschoolers continue to apply for the home study program using a "list of books used" as part of their proof, they must use books off of a BESE approved book list. Obviously any of these proposals are unacceptable. CONCLUSION HSLDA and CHEF of Louisiana are committed to protecting the right to homeschool free of government regulation. We will fight these new proposals, but we need your help too. Please spread the word and prepare for action! Very truly yours, Scott W. Somerville HSLDA Staff Attorney {{JoinAd}} ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The HSLDA E-lert Service is a service of: Home School Legal Defense Association P.O. 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Thank you for your cooperation. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- | |
