No homeschooling bill this session, Dems say. Republicans cheer ‘victory' for parents rights

Yahoo

13-05-2025

No legislation to regulate homeschooling will be introduced this session, despite the subject's recent attention and the urging of child advocates.
Rep. Jen Leeper made the announcement in response to a reporter question Tuesday at the House Democrats news briefing ahead of the session Tuesday.
'There won't be any legislation this session on homeschooling,' Leeper said. 'I think we, in an effort to be publicly transparent brought everyone to the table to listen from all of our agencies that interact with students and children and their wellbeing about where there are gaps in the system and now we're going to do the public and methodical work to explore all those places where kids are slipping through and see what we can do next session to ensure all the children of Connecticut are safe.'
CT Senate Republicans on X responded to the news, calling it a win for parents rights and Republicans.
'Thanks to the strong voices of CT Republicans and passionate homeschooling families and advocates, the proposed legislation imposing new mandates on homeschoolers will not move forward this session,' they said. 'This is a major victory for parental rights and educational freedom in our state!'
The legislature's Education Committee and the Committee on Children held a joint hearing May 5 to hear from experts regarding the state's homeschooling policies. Speakers called to address legislators included state experts Department of Education Commissioner Charlene Russell-Tucker, Department of Children and Families Commissioner Jodi Hill-Lilly, Office of the Child Advocate's Acting Child Advocate Christina Ghio and Connecticut Association of Public School Superintendents Executive Director Fran Rabinowitz.
Homeschooling group leaders included National Home Education Legal Defense Attorney Deborah Stevenson, Connecticut Homeschool Network's Diane Connors and Coalition for Responsible Home Education's Beau Triba.
Homeschool families showed up in droves to the event and joined Republican legislators in criticizing the joint hearing, with both groups decrying implied connections between homeschooling and the recent case of a Waterbury man which prompted the hearing. The 32-year-old man recently freed from a Waterbury home was reportedly found malnourished after being withdrawn from school at age 11 and then reportedly held captive for decades.
The homeschooling community, which had staged consistent protests at the Capitol have said that legislators are using the case as an opportunity to restrict their freedom to teach their children.
In addition, homeschooling families dispute a report from the state Office of the Child Advocate that claims high rates of abuse and neglect among families who have withdrawn their children from school, prompting the OCA's calls for oversight.
'Nearly one-quarter of families of students withdrawn for homeschooling had at least one accepted DCF report and approximately 8% had four or more accepted DCF reports,' the report states. 'In our 2025 data review, we found that approximately 10% of the families had at least one substantiation, including substantiations for physical abuse, physical neglect, and educational neglect.'
Christina Ghio, acting child advocate for the Office of the Child Advocate, told the Courant that the Office is not trying to 'stop people from homeschooling, people who are doing high quality homeschooling, providing instruction and regularly engaging their children in activity.
'But because we have no regulations at all, there are parents who use that freedom to withdraw their children under false pretenses and hide them and that is what we are trying to address,' she said.
Connecticut currently has no oversight of homeschooling. Parents are not required to notify their home districts that they intend to homeschool and no follow-up is ever done to ensure children are keeping up with grade level standards.
Connecticut's education commissioner and head of the superintendents' group also argued that more oversight is needed to ensure children are safe and learning.
Fran Rabinowitz, executive director of the Connecticut Association of Public School Superintendents, called for strengthening of regulations around homeschooling, perhaps through an academic evaluation or a portfolio or a standardized test.
'We do not want in any shape or form to want to control homeschooling,' she said. 'We want to safeguard every child in Connecticut and ensure we are upholding our obligation to the state constitution that all students must be educated.
'We want to know you are educating your children,' she added.
Senate Republicans also issued a statement Tuesday about the announcement.
'Homeschoolers have nothing to do with the tragic situation in Waterbury. Instead of focusing on DCF and the Waterbury public school system on how and why that child fell through the cracks of the system, Democrats targeted the thousands of homeschoolers in our state who do an amazing job of educating their students outside of Connecticut's education system. …
'The last thing state government should do is get in the middle of something that is working. Homeschooling is working – and working tremendously well. This was once again the majority Democrat party in Connecticut trying to take control of people's lives. It's destructive and it's wrong. Together, we stood up to it and we spoke out. Our voices were heard.'
Reporting from Courant reporter Livi Stanford is contained in this article.