A bill proposed by the British government and now making its way through parliament would impose the most burdensome and intrusive regulation on homeschooling in the English-speaking world. “This bill is breathtaking in its scope and reflects a perverse level of suspicion towards parents who home-educate their children,” says HSLDA Staff Attorney and Director of International Relations Michael Donnelly. “If this bill were to pass, it would be the most restrictive and overbearing law in the English-speaking world.

It places total discretion in the hands of local educational officials to determine whether or not they will ‘register’ a home education program and would require criminal background checks for parents before they could begin homeschooling their own children.”

The bill is the result of recommendations made by Graham Badman, whose report was released this past summer and later accepted by the current British government. Current British Prime Minister Gordon Brown recently dismissed homeschooler’s concerns about the report.

Brown responded to a petition supported by thousands of British homeschoolers calling on their government to reject legislation based on the Badman Report. Brown said that the report and legislation were fine because, “[m]ost developed countries require registration to home educate, with the majority also having a process of systematic monitoring. It is only right we afford our own children and young people the same checks and balances.”

In reality, few developed countries require registration to homeschool. Neither the United States nor Canada, where the overwhelming majority of homeschoolers reside, require homeschoolers to register with the state.

Rather, most North American governments have a system of notification where parents simply inform the authorities that they are homeschooling. “Registration” implies approval. However, no Canadian province and only two of the 50 American states require registration involving the formal approval of homeschools. And in these two states there are virtually no instances where homeschools are disapproved.

It’s also true that few developed countries require systematic monitoring of homeschools. Homeschoolers in the United States and Canada especially enjoy freedom from government interference. Although some American states do have testing requirements for homeschoolers, no state has a system that even remotely resembles that proposed in Britain.

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