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Attorney
Deborah G. Stevenson
Executive Director
URGENT NOTICE TO PARENTS
LANGUAGE IN THE WITHDRAWAL BILL HAS BEEN DRASTICALLY CHANGED –
IT MUST BE OPPOSED IN ITS PRESENT FORM, AND NOT SUPPORTED.
THE CHAIRMAN OF THE CHILDREN’S
COMMITTEE HAS PROMISED TO CHANGE THE LANGUAGE BACK TO ITS ORIGINAL
IF THE LANGUAGE REVERTS TO THE LANGUAGE ORIGINALLY PROPOSED BY REP O’NEILL, THEN, AND ONLY THEN, CAN IT BE SUPPORTED.
With a heavy heart, NHELD alerts parents to the sad reality of politics. NHELD, CHN, TEACH, Representative Arthur O’Neill, and many individual parents from across the state have worked long and hard to protect the rights of parents and their ability to freely withdraw their children from public school without being threatened or reported to DCF. These efforts culminated in Rep. O’Neill’s bill that would codify the right that parents have had since the beginning of the existence of public schools: to withdraw their children unconditionally.
At the February 6, 2008 news conference at the Capitol, several legislators, Democrats and Republicans alike, stood in front of the parents gathered and spoke of their support of parental rights and of their support for Rep. O’Neill’s bill. The bill was being proposed to place an obligation on the public school officials, to require them to accept a letter of withdrawal when received from parents and to immediately consider the child withdrawn. The bill was necessary because when parents sent in their letter of withdrawal, an increasing number of public school officials were ignoring the letter, keeping the child “on the enrollment books”, declaring the child to be truant and reporting the parents to DCF. The bill was designed to compel the school districts to accept the letter of withdrawal, to acknowledge the right that parents always have had to withdraw their child from enrollment. The bill as Rep. O’Neill proposed reads as follows:
“AN ACT CONCERNING WITHDRAWAL FROM SCHOOL.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General
Assembly convened:
That subsection (a) of section 10-220 of the general statutes be amended
to provide when a parent or guardian of a child provides by certified mail,
return receipt requested, to the principal of the school that the child attends
or to the superintendent of the local or regional board of education, written
notice originated by and signed by the parent or guardian of a child stating
that the parent or guardian is withdrawing the child from enrollment in a
public school and will provide instruction for the child as required pursuant
to section 10-184 of the general statutes, the principal of the school that the
child attends or the local or regional board of education shall accept such
notice and shall deem the child withdrawn from enrollment in the public school
immediately upon receipt of such notice.
Statement of Purpose:
To allow parents to home school their
children and to require the board of education to respect their decision.”
Rep. O’Neill worked tirelessly this year to invite legislators to a series of legislative forums to educate them as to why this bill was necessary and to enlist their support for it in this session of the legislature. At one of those forums, we were encouraged when State Senator Ed Meyer pledged to those in attendance that, as Chairman of the legislature’s Select Committee on Children, he would raise the bill for a public hearing. In previous years, the co-chairmen of the Education Committee, Senator Gaffey and Rep. Andrew Fleischmann, blocked the bill from having any public hearing. While he was not in attendance at the February 6, 2008 news conference with Rep. O’Neill, that same day Senator Meyer did raise the bill in his committee.
The procedure after voting to raise the bill is for the chairmen of the committee to inform the Legislative Commissioner’s Office that they want the bill officially drafted in appropriate legislative language. The drafted bill is then given a number and published.
Since February 6, 2008, we had been trying to find out the number of the bill and to see it in its drafted form. The bill finally got its number, Senate Bill 162, on Friday, February 15, 2008.
It is with extreme sadness
that we report to you that the bill has been drafted in such a manner as to
completely change the meaning, purpose, and intent of Rep. O’Neill’s original
bill!!
Here is the difference:
Rep. O’Neill’s bill would have amended Connecticut General Statute Section 10-220, entitled the Duties of Boards of Education. It would have required the local board of education to accept the letter of withdrawal provided by the parents. Its stated purpose was, “To allow parents to home school their children and to require the board of education to respect their decision.”
The new version of the bill being proposed by Senator Meyer, S.B. 162, will amend Connecticut General Statutes Section 10-184, entitled the Duties of Parents. The new bill’s stated purpose is, “To create the procedure in which a parent or guardian is to follow when withdrawing a child from enrollment in public school. SB 162 adds a new section to Conn. Gen. Stat. Section 10-184 that states the following:
“Sec. 2. Section 10-184 of the general statutes is repealed and the following is substituted in lieu thereof (Effective July 1, 2008):
(a) All parents and those who
have the care of children shall bring them up in some lawful and honest
employment and instruct them or cause them to be instructed in reading,
writing, spelling, English grammar, geography, arithmetic
and
(b) The parent or person having control of a child sixteen or seventeen years of age may consent, as provided in this section, to such child's withdrawal from school. Such parent or person shall personally appear at the school district office and sign a withdrawal form. The school district shall provide such parent or person with information on the educational options available in the school system and in the community.
(c) “If
the parent or other person having control of a child elects to provide the
instruction required pursuant to this section to such child, such parent or
other person may withdraw such child from school upon providing the notice
described in this subsection to the principal of the school the child is
attending or the superintendent of schools for the local or regional school
district in which such school is located. Such notice shall (1) state that the
parent or other person is withdrawing the child from school and that such required
instruction will be provided by the parent or such other person, (2) be in
writing, (3) be signed by such parent or other person, and
(4) be delivered by certified mail, return receipt requested.
Such principal and superintendent of schools and the local or regional board of
education for such school district shall accept such notice and shall deem the
child withdrawn from school immediately upon receipt of such notice.
(d) The parent or person having control of a child five years of age shall have the option of not sending the child to school until the child is six years of age and the parent or person having control of a child six years of age shall have the option of not sending the child to school until the child is seven years of age. The parent or person shall exercise such option by personally appearing at the school district office and signing an option form. The school district shall provide the parent or person with information on the educational opportunities available in the school system.”
Although it does require the school district to accept a letter of withdrawal, this new bill, SB 162 (in it’s current form) , in essence, would codify the right of school districts to somehow grant “permission” to the parents to allow them to withdraw their children “if” they “elect” to provide the “required instruction”. Conversely, this bill could be read to prohibit parents from withdrawing their children from school “if” parents do not “elect” to provide the “required instruction.” The bill does not define the term, “required instruction”. This leaves the door wide open to still more of the coercive tactics already used by school officials to prevent parents from withdrawing their children. It does nothing to solve the problem. It only encourages more of the same.
To repeat, the current version of the new bill, S.B. 162, would infringe on the already existing right of parents to withdraw their children from public school without the so-called “permission” of the school district.
This is not the bill that Representative O’Neill originally proposed,
and it is not the bill that NHELD supported.
When we first saw the new language on
Saturday, February 16, 2008, we contacted Rep. O’Neill. We continued talks with Rep. O’Neill and
Senator Meyer, Chairman of the Children’s Committee, on Sunday, February 17,
2008. Late Sunday night, Rep. O’Neill reported
that Senator Meyer did not know why the language in the bill was changed, but
promised to change it back to its original language. He plans to make such an announcement
tomorrow morning at the public hearing.
Therefore,
on February 19, 2008, at the public hearing before the Select Committee on
Children, chaired by Senator Meyer, NHELD will speak out strenuously in opposition
to the present form of Senate Bill 162 but will ask the Committee to amend the
bill so that it reads as it was proposed and intended by Rep. O’Neill.
NHELD will urge the Committee members to vote against
any form of that bill if it does not duplicate, verbatim, the language in the
bill originally proposed by Representative O’Neill.
If and when Senate Bill 162 is re-written in the form in which Rep. O’Neill originally proposed it, then, and only then, will NHELD support its passage.
We realize that this is a drastic change. We understand that many parents have called their local State Senators and State Representatives and asked them to vote in favor of Senate Bill 162. Please take the time to inform them of the way this bill has been changed and that we need their help to urge Senator Meyer to adopt the language in the original bill proposed by Rep. O’Neill.
We encourage you to attend the public hearing. Your input is needed now more than ever. Please keep in mind that the legislators need to hear you tell them that we do not want any changes made to Conn. Gen. Statute Section 10-184. We only want one change to Conn. Gen. Stat. 10-220. We want the local board of education to be compelled to accept a parent’s letter of withdrawal and to be compelled to consider the child immediately withdrawn. That was Rep. O’Neill’s bill. That is what needs to be adopted.
Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions. Please help us protect the rights of all parents.
Deborah Stevenson – info@nheld.com
Judy Aron –