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California Court Lifts Home-Schooling Restrictions

By Admin on August 12, 2008 | Last updated on March 21, 2019

A California appeals court has ruled that home-school instruction in the state does not require a teaching credential, reversing a February 2008 ruling which effectively prevented most California parents from home-schooling their children.

In Friday's decision, the court of appeal for California's Second Appellate District ruled that "California statutes permit home schooling as a species of private school education," although the state may restrict home education rights if the environment becomes harmful to the child. As the Los Angeles Times reports, the controversy arose in part because, unlike at least 30 other states, California's laws on compulsory education do not specifically address home schooling. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, had the court not reversed its earlier position, most of the estimated 166,000 children being home-schooled in the state could have been classified as truants.

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