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Homeschooling kills?
Posted By katie allison granju
Dr. Helen picks apart recent media coverage of a tragic case of family violence in our nation’s capitol:
The NYT’s had an article out yesterday entitled “Lack of Supervision Noted in Deaths of Home-Schooled” (Hat Tip: Lunablog.net). The article looks at the Washington D.C. case where four girls were killed allegedly by their mother, and concludes that homeschooling “kills” or at least is dangerous.
Why? Because abusive parents can stay home and abuse their kids instead of keeping them under the watchful eye of the state. Sorry, I don’t buy this, kids fall through the cracks at school everyday (they even get abused in DCS custody!) and the D.C. case had little to do with homeschooling and more to do with finding an excuse to keep the police out of the house
Jan 16th, 2008
As a homeschooling parent I’ve been aware of this story for a short time. I’m amazed that it’s the homeschooling element that keeps getting picked out when in fact DCS and the schools seem to have completely failed to keep up with these children and their mother.
A number of agencies were aware of some reason for concern even before the children were withdrawn from school. These agencies and local police were unable to find this family a number of times and seem to have failed to follow up on reports of problems.
Finally, that the mother was found with the decomposing bodies upstairs suggests that there must be more to this story. It wreaks of mental issues in the mother, yet I have yet to see that anyone is looking into this.
Thanks, KAG, for not jumping on the homeschooling element as so many people are inclined to do in this sort of situation.
Even though I’m on record as no fan of home schooling- the link between home school and this particular vile event is not only tenuous, it’s nonexistent.