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On-Line Charter Schools for Homeschool Families?
The
proverbial “wolf in sheep’s clothing” A report distributed to educate families on Charter/Community Schools. by Bruce
D. Purdy Executive Director As the Director of Christian Home Educators of Ohio, I have had a tremendous amount of information pass over my desk in recent months concerning this “new” educational option. Some families are delighted with this option; others are deeply concerned over the possibility of state encroachment into the home. This article will address various aspects of these rapidly burgeoning schools and attempt to give you a broader perspective. Let me be up front with each of you. I have a definite bias against this school option, not due to its’ on-line, tutorial method of education, but because of State oversight with this educational option and the accountability that the State could eventually place upon the family. What
are they? These
are schools that utilize home computers, associated software, and the Internet
to teach the student at home. The
vast majority of the education is done at home, but some testing will be
conducted at a separate site outside of the home.
Every state has different names for this and, even within a state, you
may run across a whole range of names that describe the school.
However, all of the “schools” have one common denominator; they
require state oversight and are bound to the same tests, goals and outcomes of
public school students. Ohio
is starting up its first K-12, fully on-line school this fall.
eCOT (Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow), is under a charter approved by
the Lucas County Educational Service Center and which a private company manages.
A recent press release stated that “
eCOT is the result of a public-private partnership funded by the state of Ohio
and corporate sponsors, including Compac computers, Xerox Corporation, and
Sprint Telecommunications.” However,
similar programs have also been popping up around the country.
In Kansas, a Virtual Charter School (VCS) was started three years ago,
Alaska has offered a similar program for years, and in California they have
Independent Study Programs (ISPs). Kentucky
plans to start an on-line school next year and Michigan and Pennsylvania are
also getting into the game. Why
are they springing up now? I
think that there are probably as many reasons as there are schools.
Using the Internet for the purpose of education is not new.
In fact, most home school children have been utilizing this resource as a
means of supplementing their education for a number of years. I have compiled a number of articles from around the country
and thought it best to provide quotes from these primary documents.
Let us hear from those who are offering these schools.
With
10 percent of Kansas’ school-age children now being home schooled,
Superintendent David Pendleton of the Basehor Linwood Unified School District
(Kansas), needed to find a way to keep those students a part of the public
education system. Thus, the
nation’s first Virtual Charter School was born.
Joshua
Anderson, an English teacher at both Basehor High School and at VCS, stated, “It’s a way to welcome dissatisfied parents and students back into
the public education system.” He
is also quoted as saying, “We believe all students who can be in public
education should be in public education. We
also believe all students who cannot be
in public education should be in
public education.”
AASA-Leadership
News Proponents
of eCOT point out that it provides a safe, secure, drug-free environment in
which students and their parents can work together toward educational goals. Dr.
John Ledingham, an educational consultant for eCOT and professor at Capital
University in Columbus, OH, stated “eCOT may not be for everyone, but it
provides an innovative choice for those seeking an alternative to the
traditional school setting.”
Press
Release-Business Wire Dr. John Ledingham also states, “For most students, the traditional brick-and-mortar school is best. Our school is for students with special needs.”
Columbus
Dispatch So, from just these quotes, we can see a number of motivating factors for the development of these schools. ·
Enticement
of students back into the public (government) school system ·
Motivation
that all students must be under the oversight of the public school ·
Providing
students with a safe educational environment ·
An
innovative alternative to traditional school ·
For
children with “special needs” (when
did homeschoolers become a “special needs” category since home educators are
one of the primary target markets?) Editors note: From this point forward in the article, I will be addressing the eCOT school being introduced here in Ohio. Many of the issues I bring up may or may not relate to on-line schools being marketed in other states. What
are the benefits? What would motivate the parent or student to take advantage of this option? What is being used to entice families and market these programs? Following is a brief list: ·
No-cost,
in-home education ·
A safe
learning environment ·
Free
computer, printer, scanner, software, and Internet access with dedicated phone
line ·
Self-paced
learning ·
Certified
teachers ·
Accredited
high school diploma Sounds
great, doesn’t it! I can’t
imagine why every home school family is not running to get signed up.
Hold it, just a minute! Perhaps
there are some pitfalls to this after all.
Are these schools doing this just to better serve their students and make
sure that all students get a superior education?
Let us look at some potential reservations to this alternative. What
are the pitfalls? ·
Nothing
is free! State funds ALWAYS are
followed closely by State accountability. Most
of these programs may be “free” to the family, but are being funded by some
other entity. Whether the money is
coming from federal grants, the State Department of Education, the local school
district, or a private corporation, someone IS paying for this education.
For most of these entities, it is the taxpayer footing at least part of
the bill. The argument that, “ I pay my taxes and therefore entitled
to the money or service” is a lame excuse!
This argument in effect says,
“Because my neighbor uses resources wrongly confiscated from me by the state,
I am therefore justified to have what the state steals for me from my neighbor (Ray
Stalker, ICHE Leadership News, spring 2000)."
·
Students
will be required to take all the same tests (including the state proficiency
tests) that the public school student is currently taking.
This is because THEY ARE public school students – not homeschoolers!
For over eleven years, Ohio homeschoolers have had Ohio Administrative
Code regulations that have outlined what families who choose to homeschool in
Ohio must do. Annual notification
and assessment are described in these regulations.
Ohio homeschoolers currently are NOT required to take the state-mandated
proficiency tests. These are
criterion-referenced (not norm-referenced) tests and ask many invasive,
personal, and social questions that have nothing to do with academics, but are
meant to assess the child’s attitudes and worldview as well as skills and
abilities. Homeschoolers in Ohio
should NOT WANT to participate in these tests. ·
The
parent is actually taken “out of the learning loop” with this method of
education. Though these schools are
being promoted as an “environment in which parent and student can work
together”, in reality the parent only assists the student & school mentor.
The primary educator in this option is the computer software and the
teacher/mentor who will be assigned to each student.
This roaming teacher will conduct an in-home visit on a per-quarter
basis. Students will be required to master all learner outcomes and will follow the goals set forth by the Ohio Department of Education in the Model
Competency-Based Programs. For
those of you that have followed educational reform in the past few years, you
will recognize the previous phrases as inherent to an outcome-based model of
education. ·
This
creates a gray area between home education and government education.
The strength of the home education movement is that we “take nothing
from the state and we ask nothing in return.” The responsibility for
discipling and educating the children rests solely on the shoulders of each
family. In a national rally I
attended last fall in Washington, hosted by HSLDA (Home School Legal Defense
Association), the message sent out across our Capital and throughout out land
was “Just Leave Us Alone!” I
believe that on-line schools are going to cause many to be unable to discern the
difference between home education and state-controlled education.
HSLDA has already said that any family enrolling in eCOT or a similar
charter/community school will not be allowed to sign up or continue as a member
of their organization because eCOT is not
home education; it is public education being conducted at home! Additional
comments to note: ·
The
article about the VCS School in Kansas states “Parents act as primary
educators, and teachers are support staff.
Parents determine scope, sequence and method of self-paced instruction.
All final exams, placement tests and standardized tests are proctored at
a VCS site.” Question. How
will a parent be able to determine the scope and sequence, if the state is
mandating the tests? Anyone who has
researched curriculum and testing knows that the test ALWAYS drives the
curriculum. We are seeing that in
Ohio schools as districts are being coerced into designing their curriculum
around the outcomes that the state mandates and the proficiency test
administered each year. Parents may
have freedom and flexibility, but only within the box of state-mandated testing. ·
This
could become a real moneymaker for private individuals, corporations and the
local district. In the article
about VCS in Kansas, it again states, “VCS has benefited regular public
education students in the district as well.
With the federal grant ($90,000 given to cover start-up costs at this
school) and the $3,750 in federal monies the district receives for each VCS
student, the district has managed to operate the school under budget, allowing
some money to flow back into the district.”
These funds were used to purchase I-Mac computers for all teachers in the
district, computer labs and equipment, hire a Webmaster, and initiate a
40-district digital learning center. If
this is true, we will probably begin to see these on-line schools growing
exponentially. If you can’t beat
the home schoolers perhaps it is time to join them (or at least co-op them back
into the system). ·
The
partnership that is growing between government schools and private corporations
is a trend of which we should be cautious!
One of the foundations of our country is the principle of free
enterprise. When private
corporations begin to build “relationships” with government, you have the
beginnings of a monopoly. No
private individual or company can compete with a similar business that is run by
or significantly funded by the government.
Also, anyone following educational reforms in the past 5-10 years will be
familiar with the term School-to-Work (STW).
The basic foundation of STW is the government (in cooperation with
private companies) determining and planning the career paths of all citizens.
A managed economy is designed where individuals are referred to as human
resources. We are moving toward a society where private corporations are
dictating to the schools what to produce (employees that can be productive) and
colleges are dictating to schools what they want (students that do not have to
be remediated). Why do colleges
have remediation courses? Because
they need to have the students (and their money) to continue to run.
Here’s a unique solution! Why
not make the entrance requirements difficult enough that entering students would
not have to take remediation courses? Why
are corporations dictating what type of employee they want from the schools? It is better for their bottom line! Maybe if employers refused to hire substandard workers coming
out of the schools, the schools would change to meet the needs.
However, the change should come from supply and demand in the market, not
from a government/corporate dictate. eCOT
is being funded, not only with state funds, but also by private grant money.
The emerging partnerships developing here should give us cause for
concern. ·
In
relation to the above paragraph dealing with funding, I recently read an article
in the front page of the Columbus Dispatch (August 17, 2000) that made the claim
that Charter Schools are draining dollars from the local public school
districts. If this is true, we will
probably begin to see public school districts begin to offer on-line schools for
students in their district. Districts
that are already struggling with finances may well look at this option to bring
in additional funds. Also, the eCOT
school has already been mentioning that they would be willing to offer
assistance to local school districts (special on-line classes the local
districts are not able to provide) in exchange for the use of the public school
facilities and allowing their “students” to participate in extracurricular
activities. ·
A recent
conflict that is brewing in Colorado may have a direct impact on the liberties
that charter/community schools may have in revising their curriculum.
Liberty Common Charter School, a parent-run school in Fort Collins, CO,
is in the middle of a court battle to determine if they will be required to
teach evolution. Their original
charter stated that they would teach this “theory” but the Liberty Common
school board changed their mind at a later date.
Some parents of students in the school are voicing their opposition to
this change. I would raise the
following question regarding this conflict: Who
has control of the classroom? The parent? The
Board of the charter school? The
local district which approved the charter?
If a charter school changes it mission or charter, does that nullify it
and require the school to apply for a new charter with the sponsoring district?
This court decision will not only set a precedent for charter schools in
Colorado but could have an impact nationwide. In
the case of the eCOT school in Ohio, through the teacher/mentor supervision,
could students be required to be taught evolution (or health/sex ed.) because
these subjects are part of the standards/curriculum being developed here in
Ohio? These are questions every
parent needs to consider. For
families that are currently home educating their children, with the freedom and
autonomy we currently enjoy, do you want to give this up for a measly
“computer and diploma”? As the lines between government schools, vouchers, charter
schools, and home education begin to merge, we will see an attempt to integrate
them all under one large umbrella, controlled by the Federal and State
Departments of Education. In
closing, I would like to quote Sandi Cianciola (wife of the Chairman of
Christian Home Educators of Ohio). Her
comments are insightful and piercing. “We must not fall for the trap. We must live by principles.
The principle in this situation is that the children belong to the
parents and government is not in the business of education.
Also, we are not interested in their attempt to rope us in with another
“welfare” program under the guise of a “free” computer.
This is a test to see what home educators are made of.
May God help us to pass the test!” Please feel free to copy and distribute this report in it’s entirety to any individual or for reprint in it’s entirety in your support group newsletter. CHEO
~ Bruce Purdy |
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