Home School -- How to Make Everyone Happy

As my wife tries out some spontaneous homeschool curriculum with our 9-month-old daughter ("Red! Orange! Red! Orange! Tickle tickle tickle!"), we consider the relationship we want to have with our state's public education system. Our commitment to supporting public schools goes beyond our very practical desire to see my paycheck as a high school English teacher and debate/interp/drama coach pay the bills. We share the belief expressed by our state constitution that society has a duty to maintain a system of free, quality education for the benefit of all citizens. Individuals may choose not to avail themselves of that free service, but as members of society, we all have an obligation to support that free service through our tax dollars. (Analogy: I'm not obliged to check out books from our public library, but a portion of my tax dollars should support it. I've never called the fire department, but I should bear a fair share of the tax burden for supporting it.)

But it occurs to us that, in South Dakota, when we choose to homeschool, we do not decrease our household tax burden, but our local school district suffers a decrease in its funding. At the current funding level, a school district loses about $4400 in state aid for each child whose parents homeschool instead of enrolling the child in the public district. The state offers no vouchers or rebates, so those tax dollars aren't dedicated to any sort of direct assistance to the education of that homeschool child. That money simply rolls into other programs or savings for the state.

As you might imagine, this method of funding schools per enrolled students creates a logical pressure for school districts to discourage homeschooling. Civic-minded parents might feel a similar pressure. So why not alleviate that pressure by changing the rules? Perhaps public schools in South Dakota should receive state aid based on the total number of students studying in their district, period. Sure, if students open-enroll outside of the district, the state aid should follow them. But if a student homeschools within the bounds of the school district, let that district continue to count that student toward its Average Daily Membership (the statistic used as a multiplier for state education aid).

In return for this restored funding, public schools would agree to make all facilities, resources, and programs available for the use of homeschool students in their jurisdictions. Currently, South Dakota public schools can choose whether and under what conditions they will allow homeschoolers to participate in extracurriculars, with those schools barring such participation arguing that homeschool participants are an uncompensated drain on funding. If we restore the per-student funding for homeschoolers, schools will have no reason to bar homeschoolers' participation in band, drama, etc. And if a school really doesn't want homeschoolers participating in activities, we could always leave the school the option to decline the restored funding.

A quick search reveals that the South Dakota legislature tried something like this funding plan in its 2006 session. According to the Home School Legal Defense Association, House Bill 1160 would have given school districts 25% of the standard per-pupil funding for each homeschooling student in their districts, as long as the benefiting districts made their programs available to thse homeschooling students. Perhaps oddly, the HSLDA opposed this "windfall" for the public schools, complaining that the districts would have gotten the funding even if no homeschoolers actually participated in the available school programs.

This homeschool family doesn't see the problem with such a measure. (In my usual full-tilt, no-compromise nature, this homeschool dad sees no reason to stop at 25% -- let's go for the full funding figure!) A measure like last session's HB 1160 doesn't put state money directly into homeschool families' hands, so the state can't use it as an excuse to impose more controls on how families school their own children. Public schools get more money without directly increasing the burden. We remove a significant source of pressure districts might feel to reject homeschool applications. And we increase opportunities for students, which ought to be the primary goal of any education policy, whether the education comes from the state or the home.

One could make an argument that parents who take on the burden of educating their children deserve direct financial assistance from the state, like a voucher for educational materials or even a straight tax rebate. However, education funding is strapped as it is, and even homeschool parents have an obligation to support the system that will provide education for every student in the state who wants it. Allowing public schools to include homeschool students in their Average Daily Membership for state aid calculation sustains the sharing of that obligation while opening the door for a more cooperative relationship between homeschool families and the public school system.