All homeschoolers would qualify for asylum

The Christian Science Monitor printed their story about the German homeschooling family who received political asylum in the US yesterday and it contained two rather interesting nuggets of information. The first is the decision, if upheld on appeal, will grant asylum to any sincere homeschooler. From the article: “Homeschoolers are a movement of sorts,” says Peter Spiro, an expert on international immigration law at Temple University Law School in Philadelphia. “The immigration judge looking at this claim said there is a coherence to this group ... and that denying the rights of this group [to homeschool] is persecution.”

The article claims Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) has already been contacted by other German homeschoolers who want political asylum. Here is where the second interesting nugget turns up, when Mike Donnelly, an attorney for the HSLDA, is paraphrased:

"Donnelly says his group is not directly affiliated with a Christian church, but his website mentions staff members’ faith. He also said the homeschooling movement in the US was not just Christian – the National Center for Education Statistics says only 36 percent of homeschooled students are kept home for religious reasons."

It has been well noted that as homeschooling has surged in growth—74% in less than a decade—it has also significantly diversified, thereby diminishing the influence of evangelical homeschooling leaders. However, to read that HSLDA is downplaying its religious orientation a bit, or at least downplaying it for this article, makes me feel even more that we are entering a stage where inclusive and global homeschooling associations are the next stage of development we face.

Update On Political Asylum for Homeschoolers

The New York Times, in an article titled, “Granted Asylum To Learn At Home” (3/1/10. P. A15), provides some analysis and quotes from Judge Lawrence O. Burman’s decision that shed new and surprising light on his decision to grant political asylum to the Romeike family, who were German homeschoolers. Judge Burman writes that Germany’s ban on and strong punishment of homeschoolers is “utterly repellent to everything we believe as Americans.”

Burman also writes that homeschoolers are a group who have “principled opposition to government policy” and are “members of a particular social group.” When coupled with the issue of the Romeike’s also being persecuted because of their religious beliefs Judge Burman found the family qualified for asylum. The article then notes:

“It is definitely new,” said Prof. Philip G. Schrag, the director of Georgetown Law School’s asylum program, who added that he had never heard of such a case. “What’s novel about the argument is the nature of the social group.

But, he said, given the severity of the penalties that German home-schoolers potentially face, the judge’s decision “does not seem far outside the margin.”

The US government is appealing the decision so this case can be precedent setting and therefore something to watch. It’s still not clear to me how or if this decision would apply to secular German homeschoolers seeking asylum but, as reported in the Times, the breadth of the decision surprises me; I look forward to reading the complete decision.



German Homeschoolers Get Political Asylum in US

Homeschooling is illegal in Germany and families that can’t afford or don’t want private schooling there have no other options. The Romeike family, citing what they perceive to be an anti-Christian curriculum in the schools, nonetheless decided to homeschool their children. The family was heavily fined for homeschooling by German authorities and forced, under police escort, to send their children to school. Previous homeschooling cases from Germany that I’m aware of resulted in the families relocating or finding refuge in an alternative school there. Now an immigration judge in Tennessee has granted political asylum to the Romeikes. As noted in The Washington Post, the Romeikes moved to Tennessee in 2008 but by seeking political asylum now the Romeike’s are making a public statement they hope will be used to sway German public opinion. The Home School Legal Defense Association claims this is part of the reason they offered to represent the Romeikes in immigration court, so it seems the motion for political asylum is more a public relations move than a serious legal maneuver. According to the article in The Guardian, “The case does not create a legal precedent unless the US government appeals and a higher immigration court hears the case.”

It is unlikely there will be a rush of homeschoolers from countries where homeschooling is illegal seeking asylum in the US. For instance, The Post writes, “Romeike said in an interview that when his oldest children were in public schools they had problems with violence, bullying and peer pressure.” It is not clear at all that other German parents whose children also suffer violence, bullying and peer pressure in school, but who homeschool for secular or different religious reasons, such as Islam, would be granted political asylum in the US. It appears this case is more about the freedom to practice Christianity as one wishes rather than about the freedom to homeschool, however, until the judge’s opinion in this case is made available we won’t know his full reasoning for granting the Romeike’s asylum.

The reasons Germany used to ban homeschooling were upheld by the European Court of Human Rights in 2006, namely that parents can choose from existing private schools if public ones aren’t to their liking and that only education delivered by schools guarantees a high standard of learning for all children. Most importantly, the Court upheld Germany’s argument that “Schools represented society, and it was in the children’s interest to become part of that society. The parents’ right to education did not go as far as to deprive their children of that experience.” Critics of homeschooling are airing all these reasons in the United States too, so we need to be thinking well beyond narrow religious exceptions for homeschooling and continue to make the case that all children can learn well in places other than school.

The academic argument seems to me to be losing ground, as more and more homeschoolers enter the work force or University and do as well or better than their conventionally schooled peers. The choice argument is disingenuous at best, since a mandatory selection from a list of schools provided by the state is hardly a genuine choice. The social integration argument, though there is ample evidence that schools create and solidify class distinctions among students rather than provide social integration and mobility for them, still resonates with people for a variety of reasons. First, our suspicion of “others” in our current climate of national fear and xenophobia makes us less likely to support freethinkers and other non-conformists. Second, the “melting pot” democratic theory of public schools, despite more than a century of alienated students, dropouts and school violence, as well as the creation of a citizenry that is less civically engaged than earlier generations, nonetheless continues to hold sway in public discussions about social integration.  I propose that true, lasting social integration among diverse groups of people occurs when they share common goals and experiences throughout their lives, not just when they are children in school. Cutting the arts, sports, and free play at recess for schoolchildren eliminate activities that actually encourage groups of children to socially integrate and reveals our true priorities for schooling. Pitting children against each other for grades and social rank in school is hardly social integration, but it does teach children a deep social lesson about what is really important to adults.

Corrections and additions to my previous blog:

1) Graham Badman is not a Member of Parliament; he is a former director of Children’s Services in Kent who was asked to head a review of homeschooling regulations for Parliament.

2) Erwin Fabian Garcia Lopez also made a presentation at the conference in Bogota. He compared and contrasted homeschooling with conventional schooling and in doing so he reminded me how no matter what country we live in, the school bell tolls the same for all. Schools everywhere use behavior modification techniques to create a standard good student, but with homeschooling we have the chance to work with, not on, children to help them grow.