ARTICLES

CA Bishops Ponder Homeschool Rules

POSSIBILITIES WORRY TEACH-AT-HOME FAMILIES

By Lesley Payne

As California's bishops develop guidelines for homeschooling, local homeschoolers worry that the views of the new head of the California Catholic Conference, Bishop Sylvester Ryan of Monterey, will set the tone for any future state guidelines.

In 1995, Bishop Ryan approved strict guidelines for his diocese, which stated that, in order to teach religion to their children, parents must be certified by the diocese and use diocesan-approved textbooks. After an outcry from Catholic homeschoolers, letters to Rome, and coverage in the Catholic press, Bishop Ryan backed down.

San Diego canon lawyer Edward Peters, a homeschooler and author of Homeschooling and the New Code of Canon Law, said in a Catholic World Report article that insisting parents become certified catechists in order to teach religion to their children would be like insisting they become certified daycare providers before they are allowed to have their children live with them.

The Monterey guidelines were never enforced. Monterey's religious education director, Sister Dolores Fenzel, was quoted a year ago as saying the guidelines were a mistake, and that the intention had been to help parents, not to prevent them from teaching their children as they saw fit.

After she was told by her pastor earlier this year of the bishops' intentions to promulgate guidelines, one Southern California homeschooling leader called Sister Edith Prendergast, director of religious education for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. The homeschooler asked if she could provide information about homeschooling or otherwise participate in the guideline writing process. According to the homeschooler, Sister Prendergast replied that the California bishops are writing guidelines and that, when they are complete, "we will call and read them to you."

In a March 11 phone conversation, Robert Teegarten, head of the California Catholic Conference's education office, stated that the conference is conducting research on homeschooling at the request of the bishops. But the information will not be used to write state-wide guidelines. "Each diocese makes its own guidelines," he said. The research is being done on trends in academic homeschooling -- clearly not the realm of the Church -- rather than religious education at home. The final report, he expects, will simply list sources for at-home religious education: diocesan programs, private curricula, et cetera. According to Teegarten, although his office is gathering "raw data" from various homeschooling groups in California, they have not spoken with any Catholic groups, nor have they met with any Catholic homeschooling families.

Attempts to write homeschooling guidelines in dioceses throughout the country have met with varying responses. Most dioceses acknowledge that academic home education falls in the realm of the state, not the Church.Thus most diocesan guidelines deal only with religious education.

However, in 1995 the diocese of Peoria, Illinois -- one of the first dioceses to compose homeschooling guidelines -- opened its parochial school system to homeschoolers. It allows them to participate in field trips and selected classes and to borrow textbooks, while stating clearly that the schools will not control the content nor methodology of home education. The Peoria guidelines recognize at-home religious training as a valid alternative to parish CCD and sacramental preparation courses, and instructed pastors to allow homeschooling families access to the sacraments of initiation.

Last year, the dioceses of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Chicago, Illinois also passed homeschool guidelines. Homeschoolers praised the Pittsburgh guidelines, written by a committee of homeschooling parents (including well-known apologists Scott and Kimberly Hahn) and Catholic educators. The resulting document praised the benefits of home-education in both the academic realm and in terms of religious formation of children, and made First Communion and Confirmation available to home-educated children for the first time in Pittsburgh.

Chicago's guidelines were begun under the watch of the late Cardinal Joseph Bernardin. When Cardinal Francis George took over last summer, according to Chicago religious education head Sue Bordenaro, he inherited a heated dispute between homeschoolers and the committee writing the guidelines. The result was a call for close supervision of homeschooling families by their pastors and written contracts regarding the religious education of each child, with the suggestion that parents become certified catechists.

On the other hand, the guidelines also mandate that all children in religious education programs -- at home, school or parish -- be tested before receiving the sacraments of initiation to assure they have a minimum knowledge of the Catholic faith. For example, first communicants must demonstrated an awareness that the Eucharist is the "body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ."

With such requirements, the archdiocese's entire religious education program may have to be overhauled, since none of the existing religious education materials present such specific teaching.

Catholic homeschooling families wishing to provide information for the CCC research project can contact Robert Teegarten at 1010 11th Street, Suite 200, Sacramento, CA 95814. Or call (916) 443-4851.