AHA Citizen Journal

The following article is a good illustration of the strings that eventually follow when taking state funding. Mary

A memo sent this week says home-school programs that receive public money must reach for Oregon state standards
Friday, June 03, 2005

LUCIANA LOPEZ

The Oregon Department of Education clamped down this week on programs that receive public school money to educate home-schoolers.

The decision is a blow to groups such as Village Home Education Resource Center, a Washington County program that serves about 250 home-schooled students, currently with tax dollars. That group had already chosen to forgo public funding and raise money privately for the next school year, in the wake of an education service district’s review.

About 16,000 Oregon children are home-schooled — their parents have largely opted out of the public school system. The programs allow parents to supplement what they can offer at home, but the state wants to assure that standards are in place.

The Oregon Education Department sent a memo on rules to school administrators across the state Wednesday, said Cliff Brush, an education specialist with the department, after a comprehensive review this school year found confusion surrounding rules governing publicly funded programs serving home-schoolers.

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The new memo says, among other points, that home-schooler programs getting public money “must assist the students in achieving the local and state academic standards” — basically that the home-schoolers have to reach for the same standards as other students in the state.
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Public agencies have a responsibility to guard public money, said Suzanne Cusick, assistant superintendent of the Hillsboro School District. “It’s our duty as trustees of the taxpayers’ money that we make sure we are doing things in accordance with the rules of our state,” she said. The review, she added, was fair.

“The standards are the standards, and that’s the rub,” said Mickey Odin, Northwest ESD deputy superintendent. “You don’t get to take state funds without meeting the standards.”

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