Audit recommends tighter monitoring of home-schooled children
By: Import User
Updated: January 7, 2009
State auditors are recommending the
state keep a tighter rein on home schooled children. An audit report showed a sharp increase in home schooled children, from 572 in 1986 to more than 13 thousand this year. It
also showed that those home-schooled children who take standardized
tests have higher scores than their counterparts in public schools. But legislative audit staff also noted that nearly three out of ten home schoolers never take the exams. Auditors recommended that the Legislature require home-school parents to notify local districts when moving out of the district. Other recommendations included that legislators consider the need to maintain a database profiling each student`s enrollment, grade
level and standardized test results.
Act 40 of 1985 authorized parents or legal guardians to home school their own children. The law required parents to notify local districts of their intent to home school and required students to achieve a satisfactory score on standardized tests or be enrolled in a traditional school. Act 400 of 1997 changed many of the original law`s requirements. Standardized test scores go only to parents while the state Department of Education receives only grade-level summaries.
