Homeshooling -vs- Alternative Learning Programs (Part 2)

The Homelink website in Deer Park Washington reads:

"We are a Parent Partnership Program where parents of home schooled children and teachers from the Deer Park School District work together to define the educational goals and materials our parents and students use at home. The first session of Home Link started in September 2000 with 38 students. Today, we have over 500 students. We also provide core and enrichment classes at our Deer Park and Clayton campuses."

"We are parents of...." ( what????  home schooled children???  No you are not.) 
This is not to say that you are not caring parents... you obviously are... but you are not homeschooling.


If you believe this, think again....  

These are not homeschooled children....these are public schooled ...full time enrolled... public school children.

What I want to know is, How is it that the teachers and administrators of this program do not understand the differences between public school and homeschool. (Sometimes spelled "home school.")  Do they not knowe, are they not well aware that homeschool means "home based education?" 

If they are public school teachers.. how can they be "home schooling"... and if the students are enrolled full time in the public school, how can they be "home schooling"?  They cannot be.  The two are mutually exclusive like public schools and private schools.  Students in these programs are not homeschooled students now, although they may be doing public school at home.   They might be those who at one time may have been home schooled at one time, but to home school, one must officially dis-enroll from public school and file an intent to homeschool form.....  once you re-enroll in public school, life changes.




Their FAQ reads:

Frequently Asked Questions About Parent Partnerships

What is a Parent Partnership?

Parent Partnerships are programs in the public school system that are designed to support families who have chosen to educate their children in a homeschooling model. They offer support, guidance and accountability to parents who are their children�s primary educators. This model requires a high amount of parent involvement.

Here you have it... these programs are designed ...
not only that.. they are designed to support an entity (homeschoolers.. homescholing families...) that has specifically choosen not to be supported by, or directly accountable to the existing public education system or it's regiments and restraints.

How are Parent Partnerships governed?

Parent Partnerships are governed under Washington State�s Alternative Learning Experience rules (ALE). They are considered to be an alternative model of education just as alternative high schools and virtual academies are alternative. They differ from the traditional delivery model of education in that most of the education takes place away from the brick and mortar school building and classroom.

Are all Parent Partnerships the same?

No. There is a wide variety of types of Parent Partnership Programs. All programs are governed by the same state rules but vary greatly in how they are administered. Each program has its own unique culture.

Isn't this a form of segregation?

What are the rules that govern an ALE (alternative learning experience)?

There are three main rules that all ALE programs must follow. They are:

1. Each student must have a learning plan for the year.
2. There must be a monthly progress report approved by a certificated staff member for each student.
3. Each student must make weekly contact with a certificated staff member in the program.

And they are essentially public school....WAC ruled and regulated.  Homeschooling exists separately like private schools.

What is a WSLP?

WSLP stands for Written Student Learning Plan. This is the plan that is written at the beginning of the school year that explains what a student will be studying that year. Having a WSLP for each student is an ALE requirement.

Are Home Link students public school students?

Yes, all students enrolled full-time in the Deer Park Home Link program are counted as public school students.

 If these are public school students... they cannot at the same time be "homeschoolers."
Since they are not homeschoolers, why do they continue to insist they are?  There must be some confusion....and to help stop the confusion, they should stop using the word and stop referring to themselves as such.  "Homeschool" refers to one who is not in a private school or a public school, but in a home based educational environment.

Can a student receive a diploma from Home Link?

This is like asking if the Public School gives diplomas to those complete their program.
. 

Yes, students may receive a diploma if they have documentation of sufficient credits, meet standards on the WASL (or approved alternatives) and do a senior project.

In other words, they are public school students and must meet the public school requirements for graduation.

.

How is Home Link funded?

The Deer Park School District receives full allocation from the state for the students in Home Link. This money goes to fund the program and provide its many services to its families.

Full allocation?   Then, this is obviously NOT homeschooling. It is not even a homeschooling model and should not be referred to as such.  Homeschoolers do not take money from the state in order to homeschool.

Can a student be enrolled part-time at Home Link?

Yes, students may be part-time enrolled for a variety of reasons. Some students access Running Start, the Skills Center or a few classes at the High School and are part-time Home Link students. Others choose to be part-time students and maintain their homeschooling status.

What does "homeschooling status" in the above explanation refer to?  Does it mean...under  home based instruction?  Of course it does.... making it impossible for Homelink to be a program for "homeschoolers"!  There is such a thing as homeschooling status apparently and if you are enrolling in public school you are not homeschooling.

 Are Running Start students full time public school students/part time homelink students?

"What services does Home Link provide?

Home Link offers consulting services,

enrichment and academic classes,

field trips, 

circulation libraries, 

a curriculum library,

computer labs 

and field trips. 

It has become a wonderful community where families and students interact and are a supportive network for those choosing this model of education that supports the spirit of homeschooling."

There is that word, homeschooling again....  This is not the "spirit of homeschooling".. since the spirit of homeshchooling would be independence from the public school. 

"What types of classes are offered at Home Link?
Home Link offers a large variety of enrichment and academic classes for grades K � 12. These change each year based on demand. There are classes in art, dance, drama, physical education, history, science, reading, writing and math. Check the Home Link web site for the current offerings" (homelink.dpsd.org).
People in these programs do dance, piano ski lessons ect too, whatever is dreamed up by the program creators and then these very classes for their students are delivered at the tax payers expense.  Just try, will you, to get piano lessons or ballet... or a season ski pass  paid for you by the local school... but..enroll in HOMELINK and they will provide that for you.

How did Home Link start?

Home Link was started in the fall of 2000 at the request of homeschooling parents in the Deer Park district. We began with 20 families and 38 students operating out of a small rented facility. The program was a consulting model with no class offerings. Over the years, we have expanded and adapted to needs of our families so that we now serve over 500 students. Our two sites allow us to offer a large variety of classes.

Homeschooling parents do not request District assistance, they sign an intent form disengaging themselves from the oversight of the public school and take charge of their own children's education.  Homeschoolers are not funded by taxpayers, they fund themselves and pay taxes tha support our public schools, just like everybody else..  When taxes are raised for education, to support public education, is the money then spent on programs like these?  Do we use this money to foster the creation of programs such as these...special programs like MEPP and Homelink for special groups of people and give them preferential treatment by using tax dollars to pay for their ski, ballet, piano,  violin, Irish dance...and robotics?  Ask your local school.

Ask how much the Homelink building cost to build and how much money they dole out for parents to spend per student per semester too.

 

Homeshooling -vs- Alternative Learning Programs in the Public School

Can we talk?
I mean really talk?

This is about Alternative Learning Programs in public schools....ALP"S

ALP, ALE, PPP, whatever they are called, all are intended to teach the three "R"s (you know, "reading, riting and rithmetic", the A B C's...and 1 2 3 's) and after I recently found myself looking into what the ALP's (like MEPP, Mead Educational Parent Partnership, a subsidiary of Mead Schools) here in Spokane says about itself... I need to talk about it to others who want to know what I have learned.

Red, please, if you will, what they advertise on their webpage about themselves... being a public, tax funded school and all and then, let's talk.

They say:

"Throughout Washington State, educators, parents and community members persistently strive to create strong educational models to best meet the needs of students. Several years ago, the Mead Education Partnership Program (MEPP) was developed in response to the desire of community members for a program that could support, enrich and provide resources to the home school community. At MEPP, the students' education takes place in a variety of locations which may include home, other sites (colleges) as well as the Five Mile Prairie School. Five Mile Prairie School accommodates teaching/learning schedules at home by offering flexible class times.  District approved curriculum is chosen by parent instructors in collaboration with certified teachers. For example, classes such as math, traditionally taught for fifty minutes, five days a week, may be taught at Five Mile twice a week for longer periods of time with additional instruction and/or work completed at home.  Conferences, which review student learning plans every month, are one way our community collaborates.

Students participate in classes one or more days a week at the Five Mile Prairie School.  Students can meet for Physical Science in their own science room, explore robotics in the media room, enjoy dance in the family room, or choose from a plethora of other classes, all of which infuse current technology.  While the technological tools we use to teach at Five Mile Prairie School may have changed over time, the mission has remained the same:  to create the best education possible for students by listening to and collaborating with parents."

Let's talk about this from a homeschooling, (home-based-education) perspective:

"Throughout Washington State, educators, parents and community members persistently strive to create strong educational models to best meet the needs of students."

Yes, and the homeschooling model of education has proven itself quite well!  IT is no doubt a strong model educational model, and it is quite flattering that the public school would actually want to model homeschooling.  Apparently homeschooling has worked so well that the public school desires to use it as a model for public education.  There are some problems with public schools using this model though.

One problem is that they have to create these new special programs in addition to to the programs already in place, and  it costs taxpayers a lot of money to provide these special schools for only a few special children,,,, children who already and who without such programs would actually have the option of this model,....homeschooling... under the homebased education law. This is taxpayer money that could be spent in support of the already established public school.  Another problem is that most homeschools are founded upon biblical principals and beliefs and use curriculum that directly reflects their religious beliefs, the same materials used in private and religious schools,  and most of these curriculum are not allowed due to demands of separation between church and state, as as such are prohibited for use in public, taxpayer funded schools.  Without such things, the public school model of these "models of education" models something completely different indeed.

"Several years ago, the Mead Education Partnership Program (MEPP) was developed in response to the desire of community members for a program that could support, enrich and provide resources to the home school community. "

"Support, enrich  and provide resources?" 

Wait one moment...  the homeschooling community, if anything,  developed the homeschooling law.. and the homeschooling law and the individuals who worked framing that law made it very clear that homeschoolers do not want or require the direct  oversight of the public school system.  In fact, they are quite independant of it.  Truth is, here in a free nation, the government via the local public school has no business trying to financially support homeschoolers any more than it should be supporting private schools.  

And actually, for the Mead School District to undertake the project of creating expensive programs, complete with state paid jobs for both parents and teacher is a bit out of the intent of what tax payers money should be used for.  Not to mention, the school district already provides an educational resource that all parents, even parents who homeschool ,can already access that if they need the resources of public education; it's called the local public school and "homeschooling" people can already access ancillary classes and programs available to all students, like Running Start.

The public education system is a tool that should be used to enrich all students on an equal basis... not simply enrich a special group of people. more than others.... nor should it be used to in-rich the pocketbooks of those who create or enroll in the special programs. 

As benevolent as it sounds to be responsive to the community, one would expect public servants to focus on improving our public schools that truely are open to all the public and  not to be busy creating private schools for an elite group of individuals.  There is however the possibility that such  prgrams were developed intentionally by the district in an attempt to prevent parents from homeschooling... without their professional assistance, because we do know some people believe that the professionals always know what is best.  It is important to note that one must disenroll from school and then reinroll in school and into this special program  and that once enrolled, a once legal "homeschooler" is no longer "homeschooling," (no longer under the RWC) even though the parent feels and is directly involved. 

"At MEPP, the students' education takes place in a variety of locations which may include home, other sites (colleges) as well as the Five Mile Prairie School. Five Mile Prairie School accommodates teaching/learning schedules at home by offering flexible class times.  District approved curriculum is chosen by parent instructors in collaboration with certified teachers."

In these programs, students are enrolled full time in the public school.. and if the student is enrolled in public school, then they are no longer under the home based education law for their "compulsory" schooling... and as such, they are not homeschooling, though they very well may be doing school at home.  Even if Parents work with teachers, even if parents are teaching in the home... the parents are not homeschoolers.  

Do these parents now "work" for the state?  Are they now controlled albeit "voluntarily" by the state?  They now certainly must answer to the state for what is being taught by them to their own children in their home.  People, make no mistake, this is not homeschooling.  In fact, this is nothing less than the state invasion of the home... and if you think it is not, then know that the state hires certified teachers to teach in schools.  We, the general public, do not pay taxes into pots marked "educational funds" for  an elite few to dip into the pot and create their own private school. 

And besides that, to be under the direct oversight of the school or be taught by a certified teacher is not the point of home based education.  In fact parents who homeschool make a deliberate choice to  reinvent their own "school."  Our WA law declares that once an intent to homeschool has been filed with the district, (which confirms their intent to keep immunization records and secure yearly academic testing for their children in case they do someday return to public school,)  all decisions relating to philosophy or doctrine; selection of books, teaching materials and curriculum; and methods, timing, and place in the provision or evaluation of home-based instruction shall be the responsibility of the parent.  Homeschooling is not, nor has ever been a financial burden to tax payers and while homeschool parents have always had access as taxpayers themselves.... to, an can make use of  public schools, they have never been the paid employees or financial benefactors of our tax-based funded public schools

Furthermore, children are always the responsibility of their parents, unless the parents abdicate or delegate that responsibility to another.. including the parnership that already exists between parents, neighbors, and the local public schools.  True and firmly established in our society as well as since the dawn of time itself, children have a belonging relationship not to "school" or "state" but first, foremost and always to the parent, even when that child is enrolled at the local public school.

"For example, classes such as math, traditionally taught for fifty minutes, five days a week, may be taught at Five Mile twice a week for longer periods of time with additional instruction and/or work completed at home.  Conferences, which review student learning plans every month, are one way our community collaborates."

Do our public servants (TEACHERS)  those who are using the "homeschooling model" of education in our public school system, get paid the same salaries teachers teaching math five days a week do, and this for only teaching math two days a week?

 

"Students participate in classes one or more days a week at the Five Mile Prairie School.  Students can meet for Physical Science in their own science room, explore robotics in the media room, enjoy dance in the family room, or choose from a plethora of other classes, all of which infuse current technology."

Family room?

DO all public schools have a "family room"? 

Do all public schools offer  a plethora of other classes... like dance classes to their students?  Do all public schools offer individual reimbursements to student's  parents for piano lessons, violin lessons or purchases ski passes for their students?  No.

  But for the parents and students in these special programs, they do, and they do it with tax moenies too.

Homeschooling, works pretty good.... not only because it  is done in a family environment, a family lifestyle... in a so called, "family room" but because there is room for family and most importantly room for a living and worshiping a true and living God.  These programs, touted as "HOMEschool" programs can pretend to be like home, they can even have a "family room," but really they are a sham.  The look like homeschool, feel like homeschool, but really, they are all about the money and worse of all they exclude the most important and essential ingredient for excellence in education, that very thing that is the foundation of the home, the very thing that makes homeschooling really work, and that ingredient is... God.

"While the technological tools we use to teach at Five Mile Prairie School may have changed over time, the mission has remained the same:  to create the best education possible for students by listening to and collaborating with parents."

Really?  Does your local school work hard to collaborate with parent?  They should.  Parents really do know what is best for their own kids and they really should be collaborated with.  But schools work for parents, not the other way around, and dispite this fact, many schools think they know so much better than the parent...which is why so many parents leave the public school situations and opt for homeschool or private school instead.  They leave the regular public school classrooms because they are not respected and are not collaborated with.

Public school at the local building is nothing like these classes being offered.  It's a complete different mindset.  In fact, if regular public school had half as many fantastic resources for public school families.. as these special programs had, fewer would probably leave. Does your regular classroom do not have robotics classes in the media center, or offer your child dancing in the "family room," at school?  Hardly, for they can barely afford to buy a box of facial tissue for their students, which makes all these special classes for a select few individuals seem more than frivolous.. in terms of basic education.

And worse, is the harsh reality... that in these tough economic times of such a great and devastating national deficit, this is all being done at tax payer's expense.  In fact, it is being done with fervor.  

 ((((Can we talk?))) 

These people are not homeschooling and they should never be referred to as "homeschoolers."   They are, like most of us with school age children in America, parents who care about their children's education enough to be involved, but they are not "homeschoolers."  They can call themselves many things, but homeschoolers they are not.  What they are doing, they are doing it in the name of "public" education, but it really is not particularly public, it's for those who drop-out of already "basic," public school. IF they were "homeschooling" they would not be funded by the state...

While children who are being homeschooled, or private schools may have access to a public school class and classroom, they are not in the business of creating special partnerships with public schools.  They take no money for education from the government.  There are no working partnerships.  In fact, homeschoolers are educating their own children at home and out about in the world, in many ways and for many reasons, and they do it, without creating burdens for Washington State tax-payer's.  They homeschool, legally as citizens of a free country and they do it, like private schools, at their own expense.