When it's time to leave public schools, do it quickly and quietly

Here's a bit of a flashback from the beginning of our homeschool journey:

Perhaps I should not have informed the teachers I planned to pull my children out of school months in advance. I believe it did more harm than good considering the steps one teacher took to keep my child in the system. This caused a lot of frustration on both my part and the teacher's.

I was at a conference with my daughter's teacher when she really got under my skin. She and several teachers before her had hinted strongly that my daughter needed to be tested for ADHD and medicated. She talked about how she ignored her own son's problems until it was too late, and how she did not want the same thing to happen to my daughter. She was a sweet woman really, and prefaced every single word with "bless her heeaaaart" when referring to my daughter. Finally she sighed and said; "I don't know how she will be admitted into second grade without medication." "Fine", I said, "then we'll homeschool her". This was the end of peace, as I knew it, at the school for the remainder of the school year.

A few days later, I received a letter stating there would be a meeting to discuss my daughter. A time had been set without consulting me, and I was livid. I did not feel that intervention was necessary. My daughter was passing 1st grade in spite of behavioral problems, and would not be returning next year. I happened to know my daughters principal, so I sent her a note explaining my concerns. My husband had lunch with our daughter the following day and ran into their principal. It turned out that there had been a meeting even though I could not attend. The principal told my husband was she had received my note, and acknowledged that I was concerned and upset (understatement) and told Him I had no reason to worry. She did not feel my daughter was a problem.

I felt a bit relieved by the fact that the principal did not feel she (my daughter) had a problem. The psychologist, and counselor, saw no problems as well, but as a parent, I would have liked to be included in this "meeting". I also had to wonder what would have happened if the Principal, did not know us and had not actually spent time with my child and us. She may have agreed with the teachers' diagnosis. It had to be difficult to evaluate a child if you only know one aspect of them, like classroom behavior only.

Suddenly, my daughter’s speech impediment became a huge issue. I received a call from her teacher informing me that she had this speech impediment, as if I had not noticed it myself. She went on to inform me that even though she knew I would be homeschooling, I could receive "free" speech therapy from the school next year if I allowed her to be screened now.

At this point, I did not want anything else to do with public schools, but on the other hand, her mispronunciation of everything "R" is getting past the cute stage. I informed my husband about the testing and he insisted we give permission. I did as he requested, but in the back of my mind, I had to wonder if this is not the schools ploy to hold onto the stipend they receive for each student who attends the public school,(even if this is a very part time capacity). In addition, I had learned they could use this therapy to gain control over my daughter's education. I am not normally paranoid about anything, but I have heard some scary stories about the truant officer, the state prosecutors and homeschoolers.

After giving permission to meet for the tests, the teacher the third and myself butt heads. They were determined to do the attention deficit disorder testing that I had not approved and I was determined to hear what the circus had to say about what order speech impediment. They tried to make some papers without showing them to me, and tried to-labeled a special ED, but in the end of the obvious was diagnosed and the paper I signed said “no thank you “to a therapist. (Had I not been advised by a veteran homeschooler I would have found myself obligated to take special Ed classes at the school in addition to homeschooling.

My son's teacher was not elated either when I told her that we would not be returning to school the next year. Her response was that he was doing "well enough". "Why mess with a good thing?” What she did not understand is how miserable and bored he was. He was just not the type to act out. He was a type to get depressed. He could easily slip through the cracks and we could end up losing him in any manner of ways. The teacher argued it was wrong to remove one of the better students from the school because it hurt the rest of the students. "But what about this student?" I asked her. She had no answer for me. She knew I was right, and in the end, she gave me all the information I needed, he probably wasn’t supposed to, to have them completely withdrawn from the school system so I would not have to deal with truant officers in the fall.

I do not blame my children's teachers for not trying to dissuade me from home schooling my children. I believe they actually cared for my kids, I could see it in their eyes, and they where both very affectionate toward my kids. I realize my deciding to homeschool after the children were in their classes could seem like a direct reflection of their teaching skills. The major reason for the teachers’ objections I believe is that teachers are trained to keep children in the schools at all costs. There are quotas that need to be met concerning the number of children diagnosed with ADD each year, ( especially since the No Child Left Behind Law) so the worst children in every class tend to get labeled whether they have a real disability or not. In addition, loss of children to homeschooling or public schooling means loss of money to the local school for that child. The federal government keeps that money. In addition to teaching, teachers are under pressure to meet these quotas.

To avoid potential drama when withdrawing your children from public schools, I suggest you wait until you are ready to start home schooling before you inform the teachers of your plans. Do not do as I did and inform them months before the actual ending date. You will save yourself, the teachers, and school administrators a lot of grief.