Homechooling in crisis?

Dear friend Aaron Martin of To Dust You Shall Return has posted a couple of links to his law school paper Homeschooling in Germany and the United States. From the abstract:

"In March 2009, the Georgia House of Representatives passed House Resolution 850, urging the German Federal Government to legalize homeschooling. The resolution was one illustration of how advocacy groups throughout the United States have put pressure on Germany to change its draconian laws regarding homeschooling, laws that were enacted in 1938 during the Nazi regime. But while legislators are calling for Germany to change its laws, battles rage within the United States over the same issues.

This Note evaluates the state of homeschooling in the United States and Germany, both by considering the historical development in each country and through analysis of current cases. Although Germany and the United States have very different approaches to homeschooling and parental rights over the education of children, similar pressures threaten the status quo in each country. For Germany to concede rights to parents would undermine its strong nationalistic education system; individual judges in the United States feel that our relatively liberal homeschooling laws threaten the fabric of our pluralistic society and concede too much to individual - and often religious - beliefs."

This is a legal/academic paper, but it helps tremendously in understanding the debate over a parent's right to educate his/her child. This is a freedom we enjoy in the United States, but it is by no means a sure thing. Be wise, be informed! This note is a great place to start...