List intended to distribute the Virginia Home Education Association's free biweekly updates, in order to disseminate legislative and other time sensitive information. This list is announcement only. VHEA's Legislative Reports report on legislative matters that could affect homeschooling, offering information on pending legislation.

This list is created to be a means of informing, documenting and evaluating available information concerning the impact of virtual/charter schools on the homeschooling community. This information consists of and is not limited to news items, articles from various sources, legislative information (bills, law changes), documented efforts and experiences and other information that may give weight to whether home-based charter schools or virtual schools are having an impact in any negative way on homeschooling.

An advisory group concerned with educating people about the need to eliminate government involvement in education and the rights of parents to educate their own children. On this site, you will find a public proclamation for the separation of school and state, which you can sign.

Most books and articles on home education are quick to point out that homeschooling is legal--in one form or another-- in all fifty states. Parents might have to jump through more hoops in one state than in another, but, as long as they're willing to jump through those hoops, they are allowed to teach their own children at home. But are these hoops actually necessary?

Every important movement or trend in this country was followed by an onslaught of legislative actions which resulted in some legal stipulations that controlled the trend. What is really of concern is that this legislative control is not static, but very fluid, subject to change (meaning more restrictions in many cases). These changes occur through either more legislative actions on the part of the government or through interpretation in the judicial system. Currently, the homeschool movement is being closely monitored by various teacher unions, the public and legislative bodies throughout the United States, resulting in more and more laws being passed to control or monitor the movement. If the homeschool movement is to survive in a manner which we feel would be beneficial to us and society as a whole, we have to be more and more diligent in protecting our rights. The only way we can do this is to be more active in the political process. The question now becomes, how do we do this?

For some years, the Social Security Administration has permitted home schoolers to receive benefits in some cases. The agency used a fuzzy test involving several different factors. New documents from the Social Security Administration indicate that the agency has a much better defined policy in place now.

Although a credit or deduction could be helpful for homeschoolers, HSLDA opposes any tax break legislation that could come with governmental regulations. Homeschoolers have fought far too long and much too hard to throw off the chains of government regulation that hinder effective education and interfere with liberty. It would be inconsistent and foolhardy to accept tax incentives in exchange for government regulation. However, HSLDA supports tax credits that promote educational choice without threatening any regulation of homeschoolers. - See more at: http://nche.hslda.org/docs/nche/000010/200504150.asp#sthash.tvLv2ItR.dpuf

Families homeschooling for the first time inevitably have questions about legal challenges or threats that they might face from local or state education authorities. Those who do seek an answer to these questions are often faced with a confusing array of laws, policies, and regulations that not only vary from state to state, but also between school districts, and school officials within the same state or district.

Imagine this situation: You are happily homeschooling your children. Your sister-in-law has said many times that she would love to be able to homeschool her children too, if only she and her husband didn’t have to work full-time. She wonders if perhaps you wouldn’t mind including her children in your family’s homeschooling. She would file the Notice of Intent with the local superintendent, but you would do the actual instruction in your home. You tell her you’d be happy to—the more the merrier! But—is it legal? Can you, under Virginia state law, homeschool a child who is not your own?

A look at the battle for the homeschooling movement and the demographics of homeschooling families that challenges the notion that all homeschoolers are conservative fundamentalists. This article is a critical look at the HSLDA.

With a little support and encouragement from each other, homeschoolers can effectively respond to superintendents’ offices that overstep their bounds.

Homeschoolers have been vigilant in protecting their rights, rising to the occasion when they discover threats to clamp down on their activities. Discusses some of the criticisms by opponents of homeschooling, along with the examples of some legal fights in Connecticut and Montana.

Before supporting a home education tax credit, we homeschoolers need to fully understand the legislation and its potential to benefit or harm us.

Transcript of a talk given by Edwin Schuster of the Virginia Child Protective Services about the relationship between homeschoolers and CPS. The text is presented in question and answer format. Includes the rights that families have when contacted by CPS.

Explains how some homeschoolers have empowered themselves and effectively handled requests for tables of contents of books or other items that are beyond the legal requirement in Virginia.

The education establishment has realized that the socialization issue will be seen for the red herring that it is, and has searched for other means to suppress homeschooling. Two new strategies have emerged, and these pose real threats to homeschooling. The first strategy is to argue that homeschooling needs some form of accreditation. A number of reasons have been offered: it eases the transition back to the public school for those homeschoolers who go back, it is the basis for awarding a recognized diploma, and it makes it easier to provide homeschoolers access to public school programs and facilities such as science classes, libraries, sports, etc. But accreditation is simply another word for conforming, and the desire to not conform is the fundamental reason for choosing to homeschool. Homeschoolers as a group will not be seduced nor will they be tricked by the false promises of accreditation. The second strategy for suppressing homeschooling is one that is much more likely to be successful, and it is to drastically limit homeschoolers’ access to public higher education. In this, the education establishment has discovered its only effective weapon against homeschooling.

Virginia offers a unique option to families who have religious objections to complying with the compulsory attendance statutes: the religious exemption. Explore the history of this exemption and consider the possibility of it being under threat today.

Recent news stories have highlighted several isolated cases of child abuse and presented them as indicative of problems in the homeschooling community, because they happened within families who claimed to be educating their children at home. Some of these reports have suggested that federal or state regulations requiring background checks and monitoring of homeschooling families would minimize such cases of child abuse. However, there is no need for intrusive regulation of the homeschooling community. Child abuse is a societal issue that occurs in all education settings.

Some veteran home educators seem to take a firm stand on principles that others don't even recognize as issues. Is it that they are just stubborn, rebellious, or cantankerous? Probably not.

As their ranks increase, homeschoolers are tapping public schools for curriculum, part-time classes, extracurricular services, and online learning.

Will Shaw answers the question, "What happens if the local school division rejects the test, results of the test, or the portfolio?"