AUSTIN, Texas (AP) – A case being heard by the Texas Supreme Court Monday could have broad implications for families that home school their children.
At issue: Where do religious liberty and parents’ rights to educate their own children stop and obligations to ensure that home-schooled students actually learn something begin? The court says it will consider “whether school districts can require home-schooling parents to follow curriculum guidelines to assure a bona fide education.”
Michael and Laura McIntyre of El Paso are accused of failing to educate their nine home-schooled children because they were “waiting to be raptured.”
The McIntyres deny that and say their children were taught the same curriculum used in Christian schools. They accuse the local school district of anti-Christian bias.
An estimated 3 percent of students nationwide are now home-schooled, with a curriculum and testing required in some states but not in others.
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