Hampton County 5/26/24
Your HEAV School Board Monitor Team identified several concerns included in Hampton policy IHBG Home Instruction. Most concerning, if a parent disagreed with a superintendent’s decision, the policy required an appeal to be made to the superintendent instead of an independent hearing officer, as the law prescribes. This policy, effectively, required the superintendent to initiate proceedings against himself. For decades, the law has protected parents from such circumstances. Additional concerns found in the policy included requirements to provide personal information beyond the law and to adhere to a particular notification format and a deviation from the statutory Notice of Intent (NOI) deadline.
After working with Hampton’s school board and Executive Director of Student Support, HEAV is pleased to report that policy IHBG Home Instruction has been revised and is now consistent with the law. HEAV is thankful to Hampton County for this positive resolution.
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What You Should Know:
- Requirements beyond a child’s name, address, and age as of September 30 of the school year are inconsistent with the law as determined by the Virginia Supreme Court.
- The law does not require parents to comply with a local public school office’s processing preferences including preferred submission dates, submission formats, or delivery methods.
- Parents are required to comply with the statutory deadlines indicated in the home instruction law, not the deadline preferences of their local public school office.
- party aggrieved by a decision of the division superintendent may appeal his decision within 30 days to an independent hearing officer. The independent hearing officer shall be chosen from the list maintained by the Executive Secretary of the Supreme Court for hearing appeals of the placements of children with disabilities” (emphasis added).
Resources:
- HEAV Resource: Compliance Cautions
- HEAV Resource: Law Flowchart
- HEAV Resource: 2024 Letter to Superintendents
- HEAV Resource: Information for School Personnel
- HEAV Resource: HEAV’s Notice of Intent to Provide Home Instruction Form (free for use)
- Virginia Administrative Code: 8VAC20-490-10, School Officials Familiarity with the Law
- Virginia Code: § 22.1-254, Compulsory Attendance Law
- Virginia Code: § 22.1-254.1, Home Instruction Law
- Case Law: Supreme Court of Virginia, Sosebee v. Franklin County School Board
HEAV is always available should you ever have questions or need assistance. Please contact us anytime at 804-278-9200 or via our contact form.
Read more about school district incidents here.
Patricia Beahr
HEAV Director of Government Relations
