Homeschool athletics

Formalized sports teams at school are certainly not a big issue for us now, but it could be in the future. I found an interesting perspective about it here. Not sure I've ingested it all completely, after all we aren't really homeschooling since we use a public charter school, but it was an interesting read. I thought the 4 points below, even removed from the athletics discussion, rang true to my experience.

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Snippet of the article
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...However, despite these factors, there is continuing pressure for increased state regulation of homeschooling. Once regulations are in place for homeschooling athletes, there will be strong pressure to apply them to all homeschoolers, leading to increased regulation of all homeschoolers.

How do we know this will happen? For several reasons, including the following:

* First, through no fault of our own, we homeschoolers are seen as a threat to the educational establishment, The most powerful interest groups in our society. Most of the educational establishment feels that homeschools need to be controlled and regulated and forced to become as much like conventional schools as possible.

* Second, our society does not trust parents and others who are not trained professionals or "experts." Although homeschooling has gained some acceptance, many people still feel there may be "something fishy going on;" the government probably should check up on homeschoolers.

* Third, the general public has accepted increasing government control of public schools, most recently in the form of new educational standards and increased use of state-mandated standardized tests. Most non-homeschoolers assume the government should also oversee homeschools.

* Fourth, some school officials are telling truants, dropouts, and expelled students to homeschool, or at least suggesting it. These officials are then turning around and saying that greater regulation of homeschooling is needed because truants, dropouts, and expelled students may be escaping to homeschooling.