Despite historic levels of public opposition, Illinois lawmakers advanced controversial legislation attacking homeschoolers and private schools that could lead to the jailing of home-educating parents and even the removal of children from their homes. Massive pushback is already underway.
The controversial bill, HB2827, also known as The Homeschool Act, was approved this week by the Illinois House of Representatives’ Education Policy Committee in an 8-4 party-line vote, with one member voting “present.” The legislation now moves forward to a full floor vote.
Introduced by Illinois Representative Terra Costa Howard (D), the legislation would “add some oversight of families who homeschool their children.” That “oversight” includes mandatory registration through a “homeschool declaration form” that can be modified with more requirements by bureaucrats.
Information required through the form includes detailed accounts on the family, addresses, age of children, grade levels, and even “gender identity.” Failure to participate in the registration results in the state treating the family as “truant, with penalties applying,” the bill’s synopsis revealed.
Homeschool students that want to participate in any public-school activities, on or off school grounds, must also provide “proof that the child has received all required immunizations and health examinations or a signed Certificate of Religious Exemption.”
According to a local Chicago paper, Representative Howard lamented the state’s inability to control homeschoolers. “Currently, Illinois has zero, I’m going to say it again, zero regulations,” she complained. “Thirty-eight states have regulations. Illinois is an outlier. This is not something we want to be an outlier on.”
To make matters worse, if passed, government officials can investigate home educators’ teaching materials, curriculum, and even students’ work on demand to make sure it complies with state demands. This “oversight” can happen on a whim, suggesting lawmakers believe the safety and success of children are dependent upon state control.
Private schools are also targeted under the legislation. From requiring mandatory registration to demanding data on all students, the bill would intrude deeply into all non-government education options.
Ironically, less than one in three victims of the state’s government schools are proficient in any core subject. Meanwhile, sexual abuse, violence, crime, suicide, drug problems, mental-health issues, and other scandals are running rampant among those trapped in the state’s “education” system.
Opposition Speaks—From Both Sides of the Isle
But opposition is growing, even from unlikely sources. The far-left Chicago Tribune, for example, blasted the measure in an editorial. The paper expressed hope that lawmakers would drop the bizarre targeting of homeschool families, saying it “overreaches.”
Illinois Representative Chris Miller (R), an IL Republican from the southeastern region, lambasted the bill on Facebook. “As a father of 7 homeschooled children, I find this bill to be a direct assault on families across Illinois,” he warned ahead of the Education Policy Committee hearing.
Proving that homeschool parents are active and dedicated to the welfare of their children, a record 90,000 + witness slips were filed in opposition to the original bill as filed, according to news reports. Less than 500 slips were filed in favor of the legislation, the most lopsided of any bill lawmakers can remember.
Multiple elected officials in the state said grassroots involvement and citizen engagement had not been this hot since the last piece of restrictive homeschool legislation was introduced.
On the Left, state representative La Shawn Ford (D) revealed to The Center Square, a local news organization, that he’s “not for it.”
“From the constituents that I’ve gotten calls from, I’m understanding why they don’t like it,” Ford shared. “The loss of their autonomy, that’s a major concern that they lose the autonomy over their children, which is why they choose homeschooling. They want to have control over their children’s education, including the curriculum, how they teach and the philosophy.”
State Senator Neil Anderson (R) took to social media to protest the bill as well: “As a homeschool parent myself, this is of the utmost importance to defeat.”
Focusing on the motivation behind home education, Senator Anderson said that many parents, himself included, “want to make sure we are teaching our kids the things that need to be taught and maybe that we as Christian parents don’t think they should be taught that they’re being taught in the public schools.”
“Parents that homeschool their kids are not the issue,” he concluded, arguing that invasive government is what truly needs oversight.
Beyond the homeschool community that would be impacted by the law’s adoption, churches are speaking out as well, expressing concerns about congregational schools that could suffer.
[Some Churches] in the state issued a joint statement, sharing concerns on how HB2827 would impact their churches and schools.
“While we recognize that a well educated citizenry equips the people of the this state to serve one another in love, the measures proposed in HB 2827 overstep the bounds of decency to achieve that goal,” they said. “Called ‘The Homeschool Act,’ this proposal has far reaching implications beyond homeschooling that could adversely effect the autonomy of our congregational and association schools, as well.”
The leaders concluded with a plea to all congregants to contact their legislators to oppose the “harmful bill.”
The Research
Massive amounts of research now exists showing that home-educated children do better on virtually every metric, from safety to academics to socialization. Dr. Brian Ray with the National Home Education Research Institute has been compiling the peer-reviewed literature, and it testifies clearly to the benefits of homeschooling.
“Everyone wants children to be safe and in a free nation we assume that parents love their children and have their best interests at heart,” Dr. Ray told the Illinois Family Institute. “It is a relatively small portion of parents and public school personnel who physically or sexually harm children. Many laws are in place to punish these parents and school workers.”
“If a policymaker were contemplating this kind of pre-emptive law on homeschool families, then it would have to be placed on all families – public school, private school, and homeschool – to control them during the 3-month summer school vacation and the 2-week winter break, and maybe with random home visits for all families once per month during September through May,” added Dr. Ray. “That would not be America.”
What Comes Next
The legislation serves as a horrible precedent for other left-leaning states to model going forward as the effort to restrict home education led by far-left ideologues heats up.
The Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), the nation’s largest defender of home educators representing hundreds of thousands of families, has released a plethora of resources and action items for parents to use to combat the onslaught of attacks. State organizations are also fighting back.
Parent’s God-given duty to be responsible for the education of their children is one of the final and most important elements of liberty and Christian civilization. If big government, at any level, can wrest the levers of authority from the rightful overseers of the nation’s posterity, the country will fall. Thankfully, parents are still active and putting up a fight.
If Illinois lawmakers are truly concerned about the well-being of children, the victims of government schools are being destroyed even as homeschool families thrive. Perhaps the efforts of the would-be child protectors would be better focused on the illiterate victims trapped in “public education.” Homeschoolers are doing just fine.
