Restrictive home-school bill withdrawn following protests

Lawmakers triggered an uproar Wednesday among home-school families by proposing a bill to require families that want to educate their children at home to apply for state permission and also undergo background checks.

A public hearing for Senate Bill 2323 attracted an overflow crowd of about 400 parents, children and home-school supporters to the second floor of the state Capitol on Wednesday, with almost all of the participants strongly opposed to the bill.

Hundreds of people submitted testimony opposed to the bill, and after hearing about two hours of testimony from the crowd, state Sen. Kai Kahele announced he would withdraw the measure. Lawmakers agreed to scrap the bill without a vote.

Kahele explained the bill was inspired by cases such as those of Peter “Peter Boy” Kema Jr., 6, and Shaelynn Lehano-Stone, 9, who were Hawaii island children who died in separate cases after being withdrawn from schools.

In Lehano-Stone’s case the Hawaii County prosecutor’s office identified a loophole in the system because nobody was notified that she had been pulled out of Hilo Union School. “Nobody knew and she died six months later,” Kahele said.

He said the bill was never meant to prevent “all of you — loving, caring families — from home-schooling your child.”

“This bill was meant to protect children who live unimaginable lives, lives that we can’t comprehend, children that are abused, neglected, at the very hands of the parents and guardians that should be nurturing them, taking care of them, and ones that were forgotten by a system and a government that failed them,” said Kahele (D, Hilo).

Parents who attended the hearing said they learned of the bill from Peter Kamaka­wiwoole Jr., a staff attorney at the Home School Legal Defense Association. The association has 80,000 member families in the country, including 400 in Hawaii.

“We are just very confused as to why the Legislature is coming after home-schooling,” Kamaka­­wiwoole said. “We are very much opposed to abuse, and we are very much eager to dialogue with the Legislature about it but the Legislature didn’t ask the home-schooling community what it thought about these things, so we’re here to tell them.”

Kamakawiwoole, who is a home-school graduate, said Peter Boy Kema was under the age to be home-schooled, and his parents did not file any of the appropriate paperwork.

“It’s not a home-schooling issue; it’s a CPS issue,” said Kamakawiwoole, referring to Child Protective Services.

Lance Michael Deuel, 14, said he was three years behind on math when they initially started to home-school five years ago but is now one year ahead of his grade. He said that he has seen his friends in public school face a number of negative social issues.

“To have your child home-schooled, it really helps eliminate the bullying factor, which puts down the risk of suicide,” Deuel said.