homeschoolers allowed to join public h.s sports team...

[ElphabaGalinda]

I think it's a great thing, but that the homeschooling families likely to take advantage, so the secular ones, already have their kids in clubs and teams even if not through the local schools. So religious homeschoolers, who are homeschooled to keep away from the influence of the evil secular world, probably wouldn't participate anyways. But they'd benefit the most, because they're the ones who aren't getting that socialization. Maybe it'll encourage some fundie-lites if they don't have to pay for it, but hardcore religious homeschoolers who want to keep their kids away from the heathens aren't going to do it.

[Rosa]

because a) I don't see what one has to do with the other and b) the poorly-performing students at the public school are still presumably able to participate in school sports.

At the middle school level, there are grade and attendance achievement levels to be in extracurricular activities, as well as clean discipline records.

I don't think issues with this will come from the homeschooled kids, and I'm really really happy whenever there's a move to integrate them into public school activities. But I foresee abuse of this system by parents of athletic kids who would otherwise be disqualified from sports because of bad grades, poor attendance, or disciplinary action for fighting, plagiarism, etc - pull 'em out of school before there's an official action and preserve their eligibility to play. We already have problems with overzealous sports parents manipulating their kids enrollment so they are eligible to play at the high school level to a greater age, or in a district with a better team.

[clibbyjo]

My homeschooled boys swim on the school swim team. I have paid taxes to this district for 14 years and this is the first school activity they have ever done. I still have to pay swim team fees like all the other parents and it is not free for anyone. My 16 year old swims on the varsity team. I have always tried to not involve my kids in school sports. My kids have done/still do hockey, fencing and tae kwon do, all private clubs which I pay for. Swimming is different, the captain of the swim team saw my boys swim and asked them to try out for the club. We never planned on swimming, it just came up.

I think everyone here knows my kids are involved in a million activities and are not the psycho homeschoolers who are locked at home. My district has 10 homeschoolers, 3 of them are mine. All the other ones are fundies and none of their parents would allow their kids to be "contaminated" by the evil school kids. As my kids have always done sports and some other classes like acting with school kids, I don't have a problem.

[Arete]

Good point that we tend to associate 'homeschooled' with 'religious fanatic parents' on this board. Plenty of other very legitimate reasons to choose to homeschool, it's not like we can say "As long as the homeschoolers coming on to the team are not homeschooled for religious reasons, it's cool".

Edit to add- I would point out paying taxes should allow the child of any taxpayer to access school services for their child. It's not the same thing as an adult wanting to be on the basketball team, or take a spin in the Navy helicopter.

[starfish]

I don't have a problem with hs kids getting access to special services like speech therapy or special ed, but I do have a problem with them showing up for the sports/debate teams. The teams in our district have strict attendance and grade requirements. The students are subjected to mandatory state testing and are held to certain academic standards. The testing is required by the state lege, it's not something ps kids choose to do. It is patently unfair to allow hs kids to just by-pass these requirements while the kids attending ps are held to these.

I doubt any of them could seriously compete on the varsity sports teams and debate teams in our district. They could probably do drama ok, but the civic theatre in our city has a huge hs program they enjoy.

[charizbarb]

Most public schools have academic standards for the athletic teams to maintain (absurdly low, but they have them). Homeschoolers should be allowed to participate, as their parents do pay taxes, but they need to meet the same standards as the others.

I think there is a cultural difference at play here ;) In the UK in my experience there are no academic standards for the sports teams to maintain because school sports are not nearly as big a deal as they are in the US. I think homeschoolers should be tested or at least have their curriculum monitored but that's a different issue.

[starfish]

The last part of my post sounded a little mean, what I wanted to emphasize is just that those programs are all really competitive here, and also with cheerleading and drill team. Worthy competitors get cut all the time from those programs. It would be the exception and not the rule that a homeschooled student could come in and compete in the sports/debate/cheerleading programs.

[lilah]

I think it's perfectly reasonable, so long as homeschoolers are kept to comparable academic standards as their peers, even if it makes some homeschoolers into hypocrites.

I think that is two separate issues. I do think there should be some kind of standardized homeschooling oversight so that we don't have homeschool graduates who think Jesus invented the constitution.

I think that if the team has rules about minimum GPA then a homeschool child should be held to the same standards but if there are no GPA rules then the kid can play. As others have said the parents are paying taxes.

[charizbarb]

My opinion of homeschooling is overwhelmingly negative, because that is the experience I have had with it.

I just feel that it's hypocritical to take kids out of school, especially because the parents have religious objections, then expect to have the school services that they do find convenient at their disposal.

I'm trying to find a good analogy. I guess it would be kind of like if I was asked by a recruiter to join the Army and I refused, but then wanted to access VA benefits and the GI bill, because I pay a portion of my taxes for those things, too.

The problem with that analogy is that most homeschooled kids haven't chosen that form of education, it's been decided for them. It seems a bit like punishing the kids for a decision the parents made.

[clibbyjo]

I think that is two separate issues. I do think there should be some kind of standardized homeschooling oversight so that we don't have homeschool graduates who think Jesus invented the constitution.

I think that if the team has rules about minimum GPA then a homeschool child should be held to the same standards but if there are no GPA rules then the kid can play. As others have said the parents are paying taxes.

My kids test in the mid-high 90's on standardized tests which is about 20 points higher than the school district average.The district calls me every year to ask if I want my kids want to test with the school to help boost their scores.(I decline and pay to have my kids tested privately) My kids were ASKED to join the swim team because they are good enough swimmers. Since my state requires me to turn in the test scores, they can easily check and see just how high my kids scores are. My district cares more about winning sports than grades from what I can tell, so I doubt they would ever ask me for any kind of grades.

[Deleted03]

I'm surprised so many people have a problem with socializing homeschoolers to school activities. I mean isn't that one of the main arguments of those against homeschooling that they are not going to be socialized? Let them taste some bit of school and have friends. If people pay taxes (But I mean that's only if you are owning your house, right?) and any tax in my book anyway, I don't understand how the school could refuse children...

I personally think that schools are not adapted to the diverse ways of learning that children need... but if there is one thing that homeschoolers find good about school why not?

Anyway I guess I just don't get why anyone wants to restrict access to public services to anyone, and in particular to children.

[chaotic life]

Eh, the local high school soccer team is NOT the best place to learn soccer. Soccer is still very much a club sport in this country. There's the school soccer, and there's the club soccer. There are areas where the school avenue is better than others, but the primary place that soccer is built as a program is still club sports.

However, MOST sports are not like soccer. Even with soccer, the high school team is a perfect place to BUILD skills you are learning, and by high school club teams go to half years so that they accomodate the high school teams in the semester they play, meeting to practice as a club usually once a week but not doing games together in that timeframe.

I'm 100% in support of letting homeschoolers access high school athletics. I don't see ANY place where it is harmful except in the case of a marginal athlete going to the public school and the parents getting upset that a homeschooler is bumping their child onto the bench because the homeschooler is better than their child.

That's not really the fault of the homeschooled athlete. Being homeschooled does NOT give you an advantage in sports, in fact it's a pretty decisive disadvantage that you have to overcome. So, if the homeschooled athlete is better than the public schooled athlete, then they should be treated the same as they would be if they were both public schooled when they get onto the field.

By high school, homeschoolers have to get pretty aggressive with their records. If a child is athletic and you have ANY hope of collegiate sports, they have to be even stricter with their paperwork trail than the average high schooler fo NCAA eligibility. Thus, homeschooled athletes are going to show the academics of whether they are meeting academic requirements for sports. Frankly, the threshold for sports participation is LOW. It requires a passing grade, no more. If a homeschooled high schooler is only passing their subjects, they aren't that likely to be able to play sports, as all of their spare time is going to have to go into their academics to bring it up.

There are only two types of people who homeschool high schoolers. Die hard homeschoolers who are in it for the academic advantages and are religious at requiring their students to excel in their studies, and die hard religious families who may very well be providing sup-par academics but wouldn't be caught DEAD letting their students play sports at the local high school.

If by some chance a very fundamentalist family *would* let their child play HS sports, the ability to allow them to experience something else in this world outside the sheltering would be GOOD for them, but I just cannot imagine that families who practice sheltering their kids would even consider it for those kids.

Thus, the families inclined to do poorly with HS academics are also not likely to utilize the equal access laws in the first place.

[Glass Cowcatcher]

@ Sophie and Charizbarb--

I know it's not a perfect analogy, I was just trying to illustrate that everyone pays taxes for things they don't use or have access to.

This idea just feels hypocritical to me, at the most innocent, and I worry about it being used as a wedge to get even more religious bull inserted into public schools. I didn't even think about the sports cheating issue.

[Arete]

(But I mean that's only if you are owning your house, right?)

No, when you rent and have a lease above board, it is expected that part of your rent goes to the township/state as taxes. Only the landlord is taxed directly, but his/her taxes on the rental income include taxes to support the school system.

[clibbyjo]

Eh, the local high school soccer team is NOT the best place to learn soccer. Soccer is still very much a club sport in this country. There's the school soccer, and there's the club soccer. There are areas where the school avenue is better than others, but the primary place that soccer is built as a program is still club sports.

However, MOST sports are not like soccer. Even with soccer, the high school team is a perfect place to BUILD skills you are learning, and by high school club teams go to half years so that they accomodate the high school teams in the semester they play, meeting to practice as a club usually once a week but not doing games together in that timeframe.

I'm 100% in support of letting homeschoolers access high school athletics. I don't see ANY place where it is harmful except in the case of a marginal athlete going to the public school and the parents getting upset that a homeschooler is bumping their child onto the bench because the homeschooler is better than their child.

That's not really the fault of the homeschooled athlete. Being homeschooled does NOT give you an advantage in sports, in fact it's a pretty decisive disadvantage that you have to overcome. So, if the homeschooled athlete is better than the public schooled athlete, then they should be treated the same as they would be if they were both public schooled when they get onto the field.

By high school, homeschoolers have to get pretty aggressive with their records. If a child is athletic and you have ANY hope of collegiate sports, they have to be even stricter with their paperwork trail than the average high schooler fo NCAA eligibility. Thus, homeschooled athletes are going to show the academics of whether they are meeting academic requirements for sports. Frankly, the threshold for sports participation is LOW. It requires a passing grade, no more. If a homeschooled high schooler is only passing their subjects, they aren't that likely to be able to play sports, as all of their spare time is going to have to go into their academics to bring it up.

There are only two types of people who homeschool high schoolers. Die hard homeschoolers who are in it for the academic advantages and are religious at requiring their students to excel in their studies, and die hard religious families who may very well be providing sup-par academics but wouldn't be caught DEAD letting their students play sports at the local high school.

If by some chance a very fundamentalist family *would* let their child play HS sports, the ability to allow them to experience something else in this world outside the sheltering would be GOOD for them, but I just cannot imagine that families who practice sheltering their kids would even consider it for those kids.

Thus, the families inclined to do poorly with HS academics are also not likely to utilize the equal access laws in the first place.

I disagree that homeschooling does not give you an advantage in playing sports.You can fit their schedule around their school if they are homeschooled. My daughter plays hockey on 2 teams. One team is AA girls team and she is the youngest by 2-3 years because she is so good. This team is intense and they play year round,with 2 -3hour long practices and dry land 3-4 times a week. She has practice tomorrow night from 9-10:30pm,which means she will not get home until after 11pm. All the other girls on her team have to find time to get homework done before practice, get home late and get up early for school.(school has started here.) My daughter will sleep in. During travel(they will go to 5-6 tournaments in other states) which will be back to back games and missing school on Friday/Monday to travel. My daughter will miss nothing, as I can make her schedule fit around hockey and I have for 5 years.

[charizbarb]

@ Sophie and Charizbarb--

I know it's not a perfect analogy, I was just trying to illustrate that everyone pays taxes for things they don't use or have access to.

This idea just feels hypocritical to me, at the most innocent, and I worry about it being used as a wedge to get even more religious bull inserted into public schools. I didn't even think about the sports cheating issue.

Plenty of homeschoolers aren't even religious, and even if they are....they're playing sports. I'm not seeing how religion could get in there in the first place.

[She Who Laughs]

No, when you rent and have a lease above board, it is expected that part of your rent goes to the township/state as taxes. Only the landlord is taxed directly, but his/her taxes on the rental income include taxes to support the school system.

In my state we also pay taxes to the school district when we file our state income taxes, so we get the double whammy with property taxes and income taxes.

[Glass Cowcatcher]

Plenty of homeschoolers aren't even religious, and even if they are....they're playing sports. I'm not seeing how religion could get in there in the first place.

The religious ones are quite literally trying to take over the world, or at least the USA, and are making great strides at that. I don't want to give them any more inroads.

[chaotic life]

My son played competitive sports as a homeschooler who didn't have homework. He played competitive sports as an ESL student who had to get up by 6am and ride a bus 2 hours to school, and two hours home from school every day, who went directly from his bus to a snack to his practice four days a week and came home and was up until 11-midnight doing his homework. He then did 9 months at a Virtual Academy, working hard hours but in the home and not a lot of homework (did it in the 8-9 hours during the day he was doing school). He is now a fully integrated high schooler playing sports, doing a normal school schedule. In all of those environments, he played in the top level teams in the state for soccer. In all of those environments, he qualified for and played ODP. He's been putting on 3-6 days per week dedicated to soccer since he was 10 years of age regardless of how his education was provided. NONE of those made a difference in how he played the game. He wasn't worse at his game in the 1.5 years he was busing and barely sleeping. My heart BROKE for him in that timeframe, but if anyone thought that his competitive advantage in his homeschooling years came from his homeschooling, they were sadly mistaken.

He's that level of an athlete because he's talented, driven, and dedicated. His schooling environment has NEVER showed an impact on his sporting skills. In fact, his skills improved in the years he was busing so far away because he hit his growth spurt and was on a team with a different style of coach that finally taught him some specific striker skills he hadn't mastered previously (even though the team before was a much better and more disciplined team).

I have to disagree that homeschooling gives a significant advantage in sports. I have NEVER seen my son's school envioronment have an impact on his athlete abilities, except that those skills DID play a role in what school environment we finally opted to utilize for high school. I'm a chicken with it comes to paperwork. I can keep high school academic records sufficient for a high school degree or a college admissions committee. I was not about to keep high school academic records sufficient for the NCAA. So, we sent him to high school instead. His game didn't decline being there. However, it *did* open up an opportunity he has never had before, and that is the reality that he has been able to add more sports to his repetoire and not just his beloved soccer.

[emmiedahl]

The religious ones are quite literally trying to take over the world, or at least the USA, and are making great strides at that. I don't want to give them any more inroads.

Those people would rather cut their wrists open than allow their children to mingle with everyone else's.

In my area, homeschoolers have an established legal right to use school services. It is used to procure a better education for children with academic challenges, to give homeschoolers a chance to get the experiences they need to pursue athletic scholarships, to allow children to pursue interests that would be difficult to provide at home. It is not being abused by any means. The homeschoolers pay toward public schools and the only difference between their children and the public schooled children is where they happen to have their seats during academic lessons.

If you are upset about certain aspects of religious homeschooling, then you have every right to advocate for things like more testing and more oversight. These things are good for homeschooled children. Exiling them from publically-funded sports because you disagree with their parents' decisions hurts them. I am not fond of using children as a pawn in political disagreements. I know this is not your intention, but it seems to be the intention of many people trying to keep homeschoolers out.

[luckylibrarian]

The religious ones are quite literally trying to take over the world, or at least the USA, and are making great strides at that. I don't want to give them any more inroads.

So because some homeschooled kids *may* be religious, we'll just deprive all homeschooling kids of the opportunity to socialize and benefit from extracurricular activities. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. :roll: Why is it okay for homeschoolers to benefit from speech therapy but not afterschool sports?

Policies vary from district to district, but in the school district I attended, homeschoolers were allowed to participate in school activities. Students from other districts were allowed to join our school teams if their home school didn't have a certain sport or program. Many kids from a neighboring district played soccer because their school didn't have a team.

[keeperrox]

As a current teacher and former 3-sport high school athlete, I absolutely support homeschoolers participating in school sports, music programs, and other extra curricular activities. I fully support parents who want to homeschool their children, if they do it well and their children are exposed to the principles that will prepare them for either college or a career (because let's be honest, even public schools can struggle with that). I do think they need to be held to the same eligibility requirements (academics and attendance, usually, and sometimes drug tests), but for most of those students, that isn't an issue. I have yet to hear one argument against their participation (both previously in this thread and IRL) that I actually agree with.

[NjoyingNsanity]

Around where I live we have allot of hippy moms who homeschool and use some of the public schools resources like sports, clubs and special education services. Most of the religious homeschooling fundies have had to put their kids into public school because they flunked the yearly standardized testing the state requires. The only successful religious homeschoolers in the area tend to be our Amish and Mennonite communities.

The other night I struck up a conversation with a fundie mom who used to homeschool at an event at my daughters school. She was pissed that she had been required to put her kids back in public school. Apparently daily Bible study and studying creationism does not prepare a 7th grader for the SOL's. Anyways she was horrified that the school was making her daughter dress out for gym in gasp shorts. She was thankful that the high school band director allowed her older daughter to substitute a long black skirt for the standard black pants the rest of the band wears as part of their uniform. It was interesting talking to her she was nice if just a tad fanatical about some things. The school was hosting a cookout before the first football game of the season, and her kids seemed really hungry the must have gone back for more hotdogs at least four times

[Kitchen Princess]

I wonder how many home schoolers actual try out for varsity sports and make the cut? The numbers have to be exceptionally low. Unless they are just bench warmers, regardless of the sport.

I don't think that's really relevant. I know a homeschooled teenager in Chicagoland who was the local high school team's quarterback for 4 years, and only took classes he was interested in. Public school. My particular teenager would have been the starting pitcher for the high school baseball team if he had gone to school (school sports are not an option for homeschoolers here). I know this for a fact because he plays baseball with all the other kids on the team, and but for the coach, whom we greatly dislike, and being homeschooled, he would have played.

Another homeschooled teen I know just finished fourth in Modern Pentathlon in the London Olympics, who partook of school as she wished, and kept up with her training in between with her homeschooling.

Another homeschooler I know of in Arkansas became a professional billiards player at 14, and that was the reason she homeschooled. She graduated at 16 so she could travel full time for her profession.

I think homeschoolers in general self select out of varsity sports. They're not the type who would want to be in sports, anyway....OR they are the type who would excel in sport and school gets in the way of that.

And then there's the example of many private Christian schools which tend to dominate in athletics, at least in Arkansas, because they actively recruit outstanding athlete homeschoolers and public school kids; meanwhile promising the parents a "Christian" education. Many of those kids would be homeschooled if not for these schools.

I'm a little tipsy so I migh be lacking clarity, here. lol.

[clibbyjo]

I don't think that's really relevant. I know a homeschooled teenager in Chicagoland who was the local high school team's quarterback for 4 years, and only took classes he was interested in. Public school. My particular teenager would have been the starting pitcher for the high school baseball team if he had gone to school (school sports are not an option for homeschoolers here). I know this for a fact because he plays baseball with all the other kids on the team, and but for the coach, whom we greatly dislike, and being homeschooled, he would have played.

Another homeschooled teen I know just finished fourth in Modern Pentathlon in the London Olympics, who partook of school as she wished, and kept up with her training in between with her homeschooling.

Another homeschooler I know of in Arkansas became a professional billiards player at 14, and that was the reason she homeschooled. She graduated at 16 so she could travel full time for her profession.

I think homeschoolers in general self select out of varsity sports. They're not the type who would want to be in sports, anyway....OR they are the type who would excel in sport and school gets in the way of that.

And then there's the example of many private Christian schools which tend to dominate in athletics, at least in Arkansas, because they actively recruit outstanding athlete homeschoolers and public school kids; meanwhile promising the parents a "Christian" education. Many of those kids would be homeschooled if not for these schools.

I'm a little tipsy so I migh be lacking clarity, here. lol.

In my state, it is up to the district to decide if homeschoolers can participate in sports so that would be a hard question to answer as to how many try out. In my district of 10 homeschoolers, my 2 boys are on the swim team, my one son on varsity.90% of homeschoolers are religious so most do not want their kids on a school team. I am pretty sure my boys are the first homeschoolers to do a school sport in my district . I have a friend in another district whose son spent 2 years on the bench for football and he finally gav up and tried anoher sport)non-school) and plays lacrosse now.

My fundie nephew does cycling ,because he can do it with his dad and not have interaction with anyone else.(he also wears shorts over his bike shorts so as not to defraud anyone :shock: )Our fencing club is about 70% homeschoolers now because my son got all his friends to join. That is a non-school,private club though.