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Amidst this bad
news, there is one bright spot for Hawaii educators. The poor
quality of Hawaii public schools has contributed to strong
growth in homeschooling as an alternative. That's good news
because homeschool students score higher than average on SAT
tests and a whopping 15 to 30 percentile points higher on
national standardized tests. Fortunately, Hawaii has
embraced homeschooling by recognizing the legal right of
parents to homeschool their children and by keeping
homeschool requirements to a minimum. The state's
homeschooling requirements are in line with most other
states. The laws focus primarily on results rather than
methods, which is exactly where the focus should be.
Like most other
states, Hawaii requires all children ages 6-17 to attend
some type of school. Beyond that Hawaii laws found in statute
302A-1132(a)(5) add the following requirements for
homeschooling:
-
Parents
must provide a notice of intent to homeschool. The
notice may be submitted on a form provided by the
department of education or in a letter. The following
items must be included in the letter: name, address,
telephone number, birth date, and grade level of the
child and the parent’s signature.
-
If the
parent stops homeschooling, they must notify the
principal and the child must be re-enrolled in either
public or private school within 5 days after the
termination of homeschooling.
- In
grades 3, 5, 8 and 10, all children are required to take
standardized achievement tests. The achievement test
satisfies the requirement for the annual progress report
so there is no progress report required for these grade
levels. For all other years, parents must submit annual
progress reports to their local principal, which may
include one of the following:
-
the
child's score on a national standardized achievement
test demonstrating grade level achievement.
-
the
child's progress on a national standardized
achievement test showing them advancing by one grade
level or more for each calendar year.
-
a
written evaluation by a teacher certified by the
state of Hawaii
-
a
written evaluation by the parent which includes
grades, tests, assignments showing their progress.
- Parents
must keep records of the planned curriculum which must
include the starting date and ending date for each
course, the number of hours of instruction per week, the
subjects taught, the method used to determine mastery of
subjects, and a list of textbooks or materials. This
list shall be in standard bibliographical format.
Generally, the author, title, publisher and date of
publication should be indicated.
Hawaii has no
homeschooling requirements for the number of days of school
attendance, the number of hours of instruction per day, the
specific subjects taught, or the educational level of the
parents.
In addition
to homeschooling, Hawaii laws allow parents to enroll their
children in alternative educational programs as long as they
are approved by the school superintendent.
24 states
currently allow homeschool students to have equal access to
public school extra-curricular activities and athletics.
However, Hawaii does not currently allow equal access.
Hawaii is one of 15 states where equal
access legislation has been proposed but has not yet been
approved.
Despite these
requirements, Hawaii parents still enjoy the benefits that
motivated them to homeschool in the first place, such as
giving their children a better education and the
freedom to choose their own curriculum materials. |
