Educational Spectrum

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I like the idea behind SB36 which proposes allowing home school and charter school students to participate in extracurricular activities at public schools with what appear to be some reasonable restrictions. (hat tip – Daily Herald) This bills seems to illustrate one common problem that seems to plague any education debate. We treat education as an either/or proposition. Either we support/participate in public school or private school, or charter school, or homeschool. Instead we should be looking at an educational spectrum where parents have the option to make use of a reasonable cross-section of the various approaches to education based on the needs of their child. I does not have to be a free-for-all, but why should we not allow for home schooled students to integrate to a degree with their public school counterparts in extracurricular activities, drama classes, or auto shop?

Why should public education be a black box where you put your student in and let the teachers, district officials, and legislature define the objectives and methods or else keep your children out of public school and not be allowed to use any of the services that your tax dollars are still paying for. Public education should be a service where parents are allowed to make use of as much or as little of the service as they deem necessary so long as their choices are granular enough to not interfere with the service being provided.