A Kentucky Senate bill filed Monday deserves a look because it would allow children not enrolled in public schools to be involved in school extracurricular activities, including sports. Such a law in Florida allowed former NFL quarterback Tim Tebow to play high school football as a homeschooled student, so similar laws in other states are often unofficially named after him.
Amid the wreckage of Common Core, though, this bill needs one brief amendment.
The bill would add a new section to KRS 158. Section 1(1)(c) of the new law would state in part that any participant in public school extracurricular activities must: "adhere to the same academic standards as other participants." This is more than a little silly and needs to be fixed. I don't know anyone leaving the public schools because the academic standards are too high.
Should Kentucky fail to escape the federal Common Core dumbing down, the distance between public school student academic standards and those of private and homeschooled students will only get bigger. This bill should be amended in Section 1(1)(c) to read "adhere to academic standards at least as rigorous as other participants."
