Okay, I don't know exactly WHERE this should go. Maybe politics, but I was thinking hs in the news may be more appropriate. Do you think we have anything to worry about regarding our legal right to homeschool with Obama as pres? I am hoping that he'll be so distracted with working on other parts of legislation that he'll not put much thought into homeschool. I was thinking about it, and honestly I don't think that he'd ever be able to legally ban homeschooling. There are just too much of us that would stand up and protest. But do you think he would try to put a lot of restrictions, requirements, etc on us? Do you think he'll start trying to make us use the same curriculum that schools do? Do you think that testing will become stricter and required by more states (or all states across the board?) Do you think that hs laws will go from being state mandated to being federally mandated? Just curious about your thoughts. (((ps...my ds was sad last night, he thought that Obama's win meant he'd have to go back to school...maybe I miscommunicated...I had to explain it to him)))
Not worried here, Autumnleavz... I think there will be changes in the public school systems, eventually. I do know that my home state homeschool association will be on top of any changes that will hurt our homeschooling rights and I will wait and act then. This is a god site to keep up on political events. Thanks for the post!
Well, he can only change things if Congress lets him. So far as I know, they didn't get their filibuster-proof Congress last night. Also, remember that many of these Congressmen, although Democrats, represent red states. This is their lifetime career at stake. They're not going to make any decisions that will cut their own throats. For example, Obama wants to bankrupt the coal industry [his words, not mine]. How likely do you think it will be that any intelligent Congressman [yeah, I know, it's an oxymoron] from Pennsylvania would vote for that? They'd be cutting off the hand that feeds them. He had grand ideas, but they aren't all necessarily going to be feasible nor are they all going to pass muster with the Dems from states where those ideas just aren't going to fly.
There are many liberals who homeschool. I think they'd raise cain and I've seen them mobilize at the hint of a threat (CA, NJ) recently. The man is going to have his hands full and then some. I do not envy him this task. I'm fairly confident that homeschooling is safe for now.
This is true. California homeschoolers are very diverse for sure. Still, although I do not see anything happening once he is officially in office, I do not know how long it will take for him to hit it.
Forgive me, I'm politically illiterate:?,BUT doesn't each individual state make up the laws for homeschooling in that state?
Yes, but the federal government trumps state government. Dems are typically big government. They tend to think we should have more federal laws rather than state regulations. I have no doubt that there are many Dems who homeschool. We have a few on this site. This may be one of those situations where they may have to fight their candidate of choice.
There hasn't even been a hint that homeschoolng is even on Obama's radar. I highly doubt it will even get a glance in th next four years on the federal level.
I don't think that I am afraid that Obama will take away my legal right to homeschool as much as I am afraid that he will place too harsh of restrictions on homeschoolers or force us to use Government approved curriculum. That to me would be worse than not being able to homeschool because that would take away many of the reasons that we homeschool. Does that make sense, because for some reason when I type things just don't come out quite the way I want them to?
Obama alone can't do anything about hs'ing, but if legistation comes up in congress, he can certainly support it.
That makes perfect sense Birbit. That's what I was thinking. I doubt he'd ever be able to ban it, however, my fear comes from any changes he'd make with restrictions and curriculum. I agree with Dawn, he's not really mentioned it. I had done extensive searches at the beginning of his campaign to find out what I could about his stance on hs'ing and never found a thing. The only thing I found was that he is VERY pro-public school. So much so that he's wanting to implement the 0-5 policy so that kids start receiving home visits and access to public preschools at this young of an age. I think IF he does try to touch hs laws beyond the regulation of curriculum that this meeting with a teacher or regulator on a steady basis may be something he'd put into effect. I'm just hoping against hope that he'll have his hands full with all of the other more daunting tasks (economy, foreign oil, etc, etc) that we'll kind of quietly sneak by him if you know what I mean.
This is what I think is more likely to happen- state regulations will be taken away and replaced with federal regulations. I'm haviong that problem with all this election stuff!
hmm...me too, miscommunicated. DS8 was worried that he (Obama) would be coming to take away our guns. So I explained the limitations on the executive branch...so he(ds) said. "oh, well then, whats the big problem...if he can't actually DO anything." :lol:
Short of an emergency executive order, U.S. Presidents are not allowed to make law. With millions of homeschoolers and all those legal associations and such, no way would Obama get away with such a thing. Even Schwartzenager said he would sign in an emergency bill making homeschooling specifically legal when that judge tried to make law from the bench.
I just dread the idea of higher taxes to pay for even more kids to be in school at an earlier age. yuck! Aren't Obama's children in private school?
So here is my take on it.....He has never said he is against homeschooling and lets see, war in Iraq and Afganastan-Pakistan.......economy and businesses failing left and right, people losing their homes and jobs, no money in the budget to keep the programs going that already exist let alone money to start new ones, oh and a new threat from Russia......when do you think he will get around to restricting homeschooling? If I were president I think that would be so low on my radar that if it even came up I would be shocked and I can't see why President elect Obama would find the need to take the power away from the states. The fact is that every four years there is a group of people claiming that the sky is falling......as of yet it has not. And in four years when the sky is still in its rightful place, if President Obama has done a good job then he may get another term, if not, the next person will be elected and the cycle goes on. Or we can join those that believe that the world ends in 2012. In wich case none of this matters anyway! LOL!
Thanks for clearing that up. I need to learn more about how our Government works.. I don't remember learning anything about it in school.
Yup. A lot of the worry seems to be to be the mirror image of a lot of th worrying from the dems about Bush 4 years ago.
I don't think Obama will have homeschooling on his mind, he's more interested in the public schools. For me I know that's no reason not to keep my ducks in a row. Illinois has very lax homeschooling laws and my mother was appalled that there's no testing and no one to check up on us. She said the government should "do something" about that. So it's citizens like that who might PUT homeschooling on Obama's radar. It's my job to make sure she's calm and informed so that doesn't happen!