Those such as the Alaska Home Educators Alliance (AHEA) who advocate for less regulation of statewide correspondence schools (SWC) are adamant that they do have local control. That is, the parent in the home is the local control; the parent’s accountability to the district is all that is necessary. Let’s take a closer look at this concept.

First, let’s consider the two types of accountability that are in action here. What AHEA describes is not local control but site-based management. Each family manages the delivery system of their child’s learning plan. I am all for that! This is where the in-district and SWC schools are in complete agreement. That is really homeschooling defined for our state; the parent manages and delivers the education. This is why I also agree with the AHEA that parent-purchased sectarian materials aligned with state standards are acceptable for a child’s learning plan.

Local control of school districts, called Local Education Agencies (LEA’s) by the state, is a different matter. In this area local control means the ability to regulate through locally crafted policies the educational agency within politically prescribed boundaries, for the voting members living therein. Simply put, it’s a political issue. The school administration is accountable to the elected membership of the local school board and thus to the voters in the community. Once a LEA enrolls students outside their district boundaries local control is removed for that constituency and therefore subject to state regulation.

The Alaska Department of Education and Early Development (DEED) relies on LEA’s to regulate the schools within their districts. Money granted by DEED to an LEA has very few strings attached. Local control by LEA’s is deeply ingrained in our American educational system. Milliken v. Bradley (1974) stated “No single tradition in public education is more deeply rooted than local control over the operation of schools.”

So, that leaves the SWC families without the legal local control the state relies on when granting money to a LEA. This is the $6.7 million dollar problem. That’s the amount of money the SWC’s receive from the state that they keep for their LEA and do not use for the families in the SWC. As I wrote earlier, a SWC exists to generate revenue for their LEA and therefore is motivated to maximize enrollment not maximize services to the students in the SWC.

Comments RSS TrackBack Identifier URI

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website