Beware! The “Non-traditional Education Centers” (hybrid/umbrella schools) which are accredited by the private Georgia Accrediting Commission (GAC) will serve as the government’s proxy to dictate and oversee the means and methods by which every home study program student in Georgia meets compulsory attendance requirements. That is unless you are standing in the door to stop it. GAC’s accrediting rules would more than fulfill every regulatory ambition of the adversaries of home study, while the GAC-accredited centers would provide the regulatory oversight. For this to happen, those adversaries will not need to successfully attack with explicitly anti-homeschool legislation. If it happens, it will be because of what we parents do and fail to do.
Over the years, HEIR has posted articles warning about the potential imposition of accreditation generally, but also specifically through the GAC’s network of centers: Just Who Is Accountable for My Child’s Education?, How to Suppress Homeschooling, Accreditation Q&A (link), California Accreditation article (link). This series is an update based on present circumstances and will explore how the GAC’s network of centers (or any infrastructure similar in concept) could acquire such regulatory power. This is not a merely speculative exercise, but is based on trends in current and past government policies.
