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Should a Divorced Parent Be Able to Veto Home Schooling?
Filed under: In The News, Religion & Spirituality
Can a divorced parent say no to the other parent home schooling their child? Credit: Getty
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is not entirely human. She is a (dramatic pause) sorcerer.
This is a bad thing.
Women are not supposed to be sorcerers. They are supposed to be docile and submissive. This one reason a woman should never, ever, be president.
Such opinions trouble Martin Kurowski of Meredith, N.H. He worries about how Amanda, his 11-year-old daughter, is being home-schooled by her mother.
Brenda Voydatch is a fundamentalist Christian who holds what Kurowski feels are some pretty wiggy views. But what can he do?
Can a divorced parent veto home schooling by the custodial parent?
That is the question before justices of the New Hampshire Supreme Court. And whatever legal precedent they set could have far-reaching consequences for divorced parents fighting similar battles across the country.
Voydatch's relgious views aside, Kurowski is concerned his daughter is growing up in a socially isolated environment without anyone to challenge her mother's opinions.
A lower court was convinced. In 2009, Amanda was ordered to attend public school. Her mother appealed the decision to the state's high court.
Religious groups and home-school advocates having been lining up behind Brenda Voydatch.
"If the trial court's unqualified opinion were allowed to stand, this case could become a model for other courts around the state to follow. This result would harm home-schoolers across the state and potentially across the nation," the Christian Science Monitor quotes from a brief submitted in support of Voydatch by the Home School Legal Defense Association in Purcellville, Va.
Voydatch and her supporters say the father, an Episcopalian, is prejudiced against her more fundamentalist Christian theology. Many of Voydatch's controversial opinions are reflected in educational material she obtained from Bob Jones University, a fundamentalist Christian College in Greenville, S.C.
"The court's ruling puts all New Hampshire parents and children of faith at risk of losing their constitutional rights whenever one parent is simply willing to claim that a former spouse is too religiously rigid, and that rigidity affects the first parent's relationship with their child," Voydatch's brief says.
Kurowski's lawyer, Joshua Gordon, argues this is simply a case of two parents who have religious differences. Both parents' views should be respected, he tells the Monitor, and sending the girl to public school is a reasonable compromise.
The moral of the story seems to be that divorced parents need to have a clear and unequivocal parenting plan.
Brenda Voydatch's attorneys argue the burden is on Kurowski to prove Amanda is being significantly harmed, for the court to order a modification of the original plan.
However, if the five justices decide the plan is too vague, they can compel Amanda to attend public school if they feel it's in her best interest.












ReaderComments (Page 1 of 1)
1-07-2011 @ 3:06PM
dougalcandy said...Bravo to the father for being concerned about his child's education, even though he is not the custodial parent. I think he has every right to question his ex-wife's capacity to home school, especially if he is concerned about the values she is learning from her mother.Just because a couple divorces it should not mean that one parent should make important decisions without input from the other, unless one has been judged unfit. They both created this child, and they should both have equal input about important decisions!
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1-07-2011 @ 4:14PM
Sara said...The argument that they say as to why it's wrong seems to be the perfect reason why the ruling is correct. One parent should not be able to follow a religious path that is so rigid that it causes there to be a problem with the other parents relationship. Both parents get a say in the religious upbringing of a child and if a parent wants to indoctrinate their child in a radical religion to the point where they're removing them from society against the other parents wishes.
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1-08-2011 @ 1:58PM
sara said...not all people who homeschool do so for religious reasons. we taught our children at home until high school. we have a fantastic support system in our area. we got together twice a month for a social activity and a field trip. most of them participated in a sport through our county parks & rec dept. my kids had to be in something for the whole school year. summer was optional because of summer stuff that we did. my kids took art classes and music classes at local studios. it wasn't badly priced, either.
we decided to homeschool because my oldest was having problems in public school and we didn't feel they were meeting his needs. we live in a very rural area and moving was not an option because of the work we do. the only other option would have been the little, private school here, but it's in a church and i refuse to mix the two.
i don't think there are enough laws/requirements in place in many states to ensure the children are learning at the proper levels. in my state, the only requirements you have to meet each year are minimal. once a year, your child seven to 16 has to take an approved standardized test (cat test, ect), mail a copy of the results and a copy of the attendance sheet. they provide one "master" sheet that you make a copy for for each child, checking off the days you have school on. 180 days is mandatory. you mail those two things in each year. that's it. your child can get every single question wrong on the test and no one would care. unreal. it was kind of scary, because you come across people who home school and they're kids can barely read and/or are so socially shy that they have no friends. then i saw people who had every second of their kids lives planned just about and they were very religious.
i could go on about this for hours.. my point was that like us, most folks go the extra mile to make sure the kids are covered. but because alot don't, there should be more to make sure folks are taking care of their kids education properly.
that being said.. if there has been a divorce, things like schooling still be decided jointly. both parents have a say in where their child goes to school. however... the parent doing the schooling should provide the other parent proof of what they're actually learning, test results, be able to participate in school activities just like public schools, ect. i'm all for home schooling, but it must be done correctly or you could jeopardize the poor kids future.
yes, the parent doing the schooling should definatly be made to prove the kid is learning what they need to be learning before being forced to put the child back in public school.
even if the mom is doing it for religious reasons, she should still be made to provide solid evidence of what is being done in class each day. religion doesn't stop when school stops, so as far as that goes, the kid would be exposed the the religion regardless.
i used some of the bob jones curriculum just because it was one of the best ones with the least amount of religion through out. the religious stuff it did have didn't lean to any one christian religion or another, it was all general biblical stuff on a child's level, like what would would be in a bible story book. they, by FAR, have the best spelling books on the planet.
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1-08-2011 @ 10:28PM
Sandyone said..."they, by FAR, have the best spelling books on the planet."
Heh, heh...do you have any leftovers that you can send to the guy who wrote this blog post? Maybe a proof-reading checklist?
Sorry, but anyone who thinks public school is a reasonable 'compromise' is wrong. I could see private school as a compromise, but how is tossing a kid into public school any kind of compromise? Mom stops doing what she's doing and does *exactly* what the dad wants. Last I checked, 'compromise' involved both parties coming towards each other and meeting somewhere in the middle.
1-10-2011 @ 9:07AM
bb&j said...I'm glad the court ruled for the child to attend public school. It looks as though the mother was using home schooling to alienate the child from the father. plan and simple.
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1-12-2011 @ 3:18PM
swether said...As a homeschooling mom, I understand that most public school parents have no clue what goes on in our lives. And I think this scares them. But I am so tired of hearing about the problems associated with homeschooling. The first issue in this article should be divorce. If the people had married compatible partners, there would be no need for this to go to court. They would be happily going about either homeschooling or public schooling and the child wouldn't be in the middle. But since they couldn't get along, both parents are demonized and the child will have to "chose" between them. Both obviously love her, and want what they think is best. But the question is what was the understanding about homeschooling when they were married?
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