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New Mexico Department of Education Admits Birth Date Requests Exceed Legal Requirements

Many of you have received letters from Dr. Michael Kaplan at the New Mexico Department of Education notifying you that your homeschool registration form has NOT been accepted because it lacked the date of birth for your children. Those of you who received these letters have already been threatened with legal proceedings to enforce the Compulsory School Attendance Act. Thanks to the hard work of homeschool leaders and the courage of homeschoolers across the state, the New Mexico Department of Education has finally admitted that Dr. Kaplan's demands exceed the law. Because of this, we are changing our notice of intent form on the Home School Legal Defense Association website.

On February 25, 2003, two homeschool parents met with Department of Education staff to discuss the problems with the notification procedures. Although the meeting began with some tension, Steven Sanchez, the Director of Curriculum, Instruction, and Learning Technologies, was very helpful. The Department staff admitted that the law does not require birth dates on a notification of intent form, and recognized that homeschoolers do have legitimate privacy concerns. The Department officials were surprised to discover how intimidating their form letters seemed to a homeschooling mother who is concerned about prosecution. When they realized how threatening their letters sounded, they promised to rewrite them.

The Department of Education has requested an opportunity to talk with homeschoolers at the Christian Association of Parent Educators of New Mexico conference in April. HSLDA's Scott Somerville will be speaking at this conference and meeting with these officials.