California Parents Contributing to the Homeschool Boomhttps://californiaglobe.com/articles/california-parents-contributing-to-the-homeschool-boom/California is experiencing a homeschool boom, and it’s not just a result of school lockdowns during the COVID pandemic. The pandemic may have been the first time parents really and thoroughly saw what their kids were being taught in California public schools. And many were shocked.
Lance Izumi, senior director of the Center for Education at the Pacific Research Institute recently finished writing his latest book, “The Homeschool Boom,” which looks at the increase in homeschooling across the United States, and in California.
Izumi says at the start of the pandemic, in spring 2020, just over 5 percent of American households reported homeschooling school-aged children, based on data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
By the fall of 2020 – only 6 months later – that percentage had more than doubled to 11 percent. Izumi notes that the Census Bureau used clarifying information on the survey to ensure that households were reporting true homeschooling and not distance or remote learning through a public or private school.
...
“Here in California, we are seeing this homeschooling phenomenon as well. Between the 2020 and 2021 school years, tens of thousands of students have left the regular public schools,” Izumi said. “The latest total shows that 160,000 students have left the public schools here in California. Where have these students gone? Many are now being homeschooled. In Los Angeles, the number of parents filing private school affidavits, which parents must file with the state in order to homeschool their children independently, more than doubled.”
My emphasis. In CA, "homeschooling" is not a "thing" in CA law. The four ways in which parents homeschool within CA's laws are:
* "Tutoring", the parent has the teaching credential for the grades being taught;
* Public school Independent Study Program (ISP), the students are still enrolled in a public school and subject to that school's oversight;
* Private school ISP, the ISP provides legal status (see below), oversight, and varying degrees of assistance and advice; the private school may have a campus, or may be only homeschooled students
* Private School Affidavit;
every private school in CA files an R4 Private School Affidavit annually; the R4 notifies the state of the existence of a private school; the R4 provides very basic info, such as address, grades taught, and number of students; the State of California receives and keeps R4s on file, there is no approval or disapproval in the process.
The reason for that explanation - something my wife and I told homeschoolers newly filling out their R4s at our annual (for several years) "Affidavit Night" - is to explain what I italicized in the article quote. Those newly homeschooling parents filing a Private School Affidavit are a large fraction of newly homeschooling parents in CA. It does not include parents homeschooling under the aegis of an ISP and thus do not need to file an R4.
I've been wondering for some time how many parents homeschooling during Covid would keep doing so once things reverted back to normal-ish. I think teacher's unions game-playing increased the number of persistent parents, and those who filed R4s are some of the most likely to persist. The R4 and filing it are not particularly difficult, but the mental side of it, doing something very official, is a bit scary and intimidating for many.
