(Editorial - Graphic Illustration - MetroCreativeConnection)

While politicians and some homeschool advocates continue to ask for West Virginia’s laws (and enforcement) regarding homeschooling to remain unchanged, the West Virginia Department of Education has produced data that should change their minds.

According to a report by WCHS, the data show only one-third of Mountain State homeschool families turn in the required assessments

As WCHS points out, state law gives county school districts the authority to take nonreporting families to court. But it does not require them to do so.

After the death of Kyneddi Miller in Boone County, it was discovered Kyneddi’s mother, Julie, filed a notice of intent to homeschool her daughter in 2021, but never finished the required assessments. And Boone County Schools never asked about them.

“I think we were a little surprised at the small amount of families that have turned in those assessments,” state superintendent Michele Blatt told WCHS.

Surely that surprise will boost lawmakers’ sense of urgency in strengthening both the reporting requirements and enforcement of those requirements. After all, WCHS says the data shows 32,873 students have been actively homeschooled here in the last four years. That’s tens of thousands of West Virginia kids we should be protecting.

“We’ve got counties that are currently tracking 30% chronically absent students that are in the public schools,” Blatt told WCHS. “I think what has happened over the course of the last several years is that we have lots of school choice options for families, which is good. But it’s also requiring a great deal of record keeping and tracking by our counties on an attendance director that was already pretty well overwhelmed …”

Change is needed all around, then. The assessment process, laws and enforcement must all be improved. School boards must have the support they need. And through it all, mandated reporters must say something if they see something AND have the assurance their reports will be heard and investigated.

“We have amazing homeschool families that do it right, do it religiously and it’s what’s best for their child. Every parent should have that choice,” Blatt told WCHS.

Those homeschool families who are following the rules and teaching their kids outside the public school system because they truly believe it is what’s best for their children will have no problem adhering to any changes in the process.

In fact, if it means doing a better job of protecting West Virginia’s children, no one — certainly no elected official who makes a point of repeating how important the wellbeing of children is to him or her — will have a problem with getting this system right.