Long-time readers of Home Education Magazine know we've addressed the issue of charter, cyber, e-schools and related programs for several years now, highlighting the pros and cons of these programs, explaining the dangers we see and offering potential solutions. As these programs have grown and proliferated in state after state we've come to feel they are perhaps the single most important issue affecting the future of homeschooling.

If the lines between homeschooling and public school become too blurred, or are even erased, how then will future generations view this moment in time? Our fervent hope is that we won't be remembered as those who clumsily dropped the ball and let the promising potential of homeschooling in freedom and independence be lost.

Understanding the dynamics involved is critical to ensuring that homeschoolers are not eventually drawn back into the public and private school systems. Among those working the hardest to bring clarification and understanding to this issue is a group known as "We Stand for Homeschooling," whose website can be found at http://www.westandforhomeschooling.org.

The publishers of Home Education Magazine have chosen to sign the "We Stand for Homeschooling" Statement and Resolution, and are distributing the announcement below. We encourage you to stand with us as an individual homeschooler, and to share the "We Stand for Homeschooling" Statement and Resolution with your support group or organization through your newsletter, web site, group discussion list, park days, meetings and other avenues of information. We hope your group will join the many groups and organizations already supporting this effort to stand together for homeschooling.

Sincerely,
Mark and Helen Hegener
Home Education Magazine

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Your support is needed to make a strong stand for homeschooling

June 5, 2003 - Please join many homeschoolers and their allies who are publicly taking a stand for homeschooling. Why is this necessary? Because homeschooling freedoms are being threatened by the increase in both corporately-owned cyber charter schools and the creation of school district-sponsored programs directed at homeschoolers. Both are designed to bring homeschoolers under the control of public schools.

Most homeschoolers understand the difference between enrollment in taxpayer funded schools and homeschooling, which requires neither enrollment nor taxpayer funding. With the We Stand for Homeschooling (WSFH) Statement and Resolution, homeschoolers and their allies can stand together to clearly identify these important distinctions.

The WSFH Statement and Resolution distinguishes between homeschoolers and those who would make a profit from publicly funded, home-based education. Citing a variety of media reports, the Statement clearly shows why it is important to take this stand for homeschooling.

No one can or should claim to define homeschooling, and the authors of WSFH were careful not to do so. However, it is not difficult to identify what homeschooling is not. Because cyber charter schools work hard to be so visible and so public, they could easily become the standard of identity that the general public and legislators expect when they think of homeschooling. "Blending" homeschooling with public schools risks the same outcome.

The WSFH Statement and Resolution was authored by an ad hoc committee. Joining the committee are many original signers from diverse political, philosophical, religious, and activist perspectives. All are standing together to preserve homeschooling and the opportunity for the many families who want to choose homeschooling, free from the government regulation and other requirements that come with taxpayer funding. You are encouraged to visit http://www.westandforhomeschooling.org to view the WSFH Statement and Resolution and to add your name to those standing for homeschooling.