Hands Off My Child's Education
The state does not know my children. I do.
There truly is a special kind of arrogance that only the government can perfect: the assumption that if something isn’t approved, documented, filed, and stored in a database somewhere, it doesn’t quite count. Preferably on triplicate.
Connecticut’s H.B. 5468 is built around that exact bureaucratic bullmalarky.
Parents, particularly those of us who have claimed the freedom to teach our own children instead of passing it to the government, should be paying attention. But, not only us homeschooling families. Oversight and overreach into your home and the choices you make for your children should raise the eyebrow of any parent.
My family doesn’t live anywhere near Connecticut. We (thank God) live in a hands-off homeschooling state. But, that does not matter.
Any added governmental reach into the sacred role of a parent’s primary decision making for any homeschooling family in any corner of the United States keeps all of us alert.
This bill isn’t a framework or a safety measure, whatever its sponsors call it. It’s a philosophical position: one that places the state as senior partner in the education of your child. Not a resource. Not a support system. An authority to evaluate what you’re doing and decide whether it’s sufficient.
Under H.B. 5468, parents must register their intent to homeschool, report annually, produce evidence of learning, and retain records for years. Individually, each requirement sounds administrative.
Together, they amount to something else: a system in which your child’s education exists on the state’s terms, subject to the state’s judgment, validated on the state’s schedule.
This violates the very reason most of us chose to homeschool in the first place.
In fewer words: we don’t want you in our home or imposing what you think our children need.
Here’s the thing about that. Once the state requires proof, it assumes the right to judge that proof. And once it judges, it governs. That’s not a slippery slope argument, that’s just how policy works. A portfolio requirement today becomes a standardized metric next session. Oversight becomes enforcement. These systems don’t contract; they expand, and they normalize.
Connecticut has historically been a fairly hands-off state, recognizing the autonomy of parents as the decision makers for their children. H.B. 5468’s language builds a regulatory lens through which homeschooling parents are treated as suspect rather than respecting parents as the primary decision-makers for their child’s education.
The argument for bills like this is always the same: children falling through the cracks, safety nets, accountability. And those concerns aren’t fictional — there are genuinely at-risk children, and no serious person disputes that. But, broad systems built around fringe cases usually don’t stay confined to them. They become the default posture toward every family, including the ones who have done nothing to warrant scrutiny.
Which raises the question this bill is really answering: who does the education of a child ultimately belong to? What is being proposed does not violate The 14th Amendment. And yes, there are other states with more restrictive laws, inserting the state and limiting the parent.
However, this is a sizable leap for Connecticut, from one of the lowest regulation states to a moderately high regulated homeschooling state. Simply because The 14th Amendment isn’t being violated is not the same as overreach. A law can feel intrusive and still be 100% constitutional under current precedent.
When the state inserts itself into the parent-child relationship — even with good intentions, even incrementally — it doesn’t just add a layer of oversight. It reassigns authority. It says: your judgment is provisional. Subject to review. Contingent on our approval.
So let me give you insight from my ten-year-old son. I asked him how learning at home works for him. This is what he said:
“Well, for one thing, I learn more from you. I mean, you’re my mom. So, like, you know how to talk about things in a way I understand. Also, if I need to go to the bathroom, I can’t concentrate. If I asked to go to the bathroom, I wasn’t allowed until break time. And I wasn’t learning anything while I was told to wait until the lesson was over, because all I was thinking about was having to go pee. I hate being on a computer. Sometimes assignments were on the computer, and sometimes learning games on the computer was our “break time”. I just don’t like learning from a computer. I don’t really learn anything that way. I like how we take a break in between lessons, I get to go outside. That helps me focus after the break is over because I got my energy out. I mean, they used to talk about nouns and verbs and parts of speech, all the time. I didn’t understand anything though. When you’re teaching me those things, it’s different. I didn’t even know when you asked me about the people in the story and what they were doing, I was learning the parts of speech. I love when we do math together because if I can’t see it right away, you just talk with me and then I get it. Like before, if I didn’t understand, it was time to move on, and I felt behind. And just, not really smart. But. Homeschool is good for me because I understand the way you teach me, and I know that I am smart and I’m always learning.”
H.B. 5468 would require my son’s education to be validated by people who would have made him hold it until break time.
That isn’t just adding paperwork.
That’s redefining parenthood itself.
That’s a line worth holding.
Quietly Becoming Jess is a free publication and 100% reader supported.
The greatest compliment you could offer is sharing this article with a friend.
If you find value in this writing space and would like to support my work with a donation—of any amount—it is deeply appreciated.
My full-time work is wife, mother, and home educator. The paycheck is hugs and kisses—the very best kind.
Your support helps make it possible for me to continue researching and writing, my small way of contributing thoughtful conversation to the world we’re all trying to understand together.