No More Public School

copyright © Harold Zina Bennett

Following article excerpted from NO MORE PUBLIC SCHOOLS co-published by Random house Inc. 201 E. 50th St., New York, N.Y. 10022
and The Bookworks, 1409 Fifth St. Berkeley Calif. 94710 and available from your local bookstore for $2.95.

THIS BOOK IS FOR PEOPLE WHO:

don't like the public schools and think they have no alternative OR teach in public schools
OR are thinking about making their own school
OR have a school going and are looking for tools to continue, improve, or expand their operation
OR are curious members of the CIA, the State Department of Education, the PTA or other subversive organizations

My purpose is neither to romanticize nor to complain, but to make it possible for people with little or no previous experience to build realistic alternatives to the public school system.

HOW TO TAKE YOUR CHILD OUT OF PUBLIC SCHOOL

BREAKING LOOSE

Compulsory Education means that your child must be in school. But there are a number of ways to take your child out of public school and avoid hassles with the authorities too. In the past few years parents have learned to do this in the following ways:

• take your child out of public school and tell the school authorities that you are moving to another state

• take your child out of public school and tell the school authorities that you are enrolling him in a private school

• never register your child in public school in the first place

• tell the authorities that you are starting a school of your own, then put together a school on paper only.

After you've taken your child out of public school you can:

• do nothing more

• educate your child at home yourself—or with a little help from your friends

• put your child in an existing private school

• make your own school with as many students and teachers as you want.

LAWS IN CALIFORNIA AND ELSEWHERE

Although my focus is on California laws, I will tell you as I go along how to get more specific information on laws in your own state. In many cases California is looser, in other cases it's tighter, than other states. For this reason, if no other, California law works well as a reference point from which to proceed, no matter what state you live in.

HERE'S HOW I DID IT

In California there are no official documents to sign to take your child out of public school. It does not matter, either, whether you take your child out in January or June or December. Why not take him out today?

Four days before I took my son out of school, I wrote this letter:

My name
address
date

Dear . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ,
Beginning on (date), my child (name), will no longer be attending (name) School. At that time we plan to enroll him in a private school.