When surfaced racist and anti-Semitic lessons, posts, and videos from a neo-Nazi home-schooling group in Ohio last week, state and local leaders reacted with swift condemnation.
An official with the Ohio Department of Education that the agency would investigate the group鈥檚 compliance with statutory and regulatory requirements. Interim Superintendent of Public Instruction Stephanie K. Siddens called the lessons 鈥渞acist, antisemitic, and fascist.鈥�
鈥淭here is absolutely no place for hate-filled, divisive and hurtful instruction in Ohio鈥檚 schools, including our state鈥檚 home-schooling community,鈥� she said in a statement.
Despite these strong words, there鈥檚 a limit to how much oversight the state wields. The story of this group, known as 鈥淒issident Homeschool鈥� on the online platform Telegram, underscores just how many regulatory gray areas surround home schooling.
Curriculum is one. Home-schoolers in Ohio are required to cover certain subjects, but how they teach them鈥攚hat materials and instructional methods they use鈥攊s up to them.
This is the case across the United States, said Carmen Longoria-Green, the board chair of Coalition for Responsible Home Education, an advocacy and research group. While the majority of states鈥�29 plus the District of Columbia鈥攔equire certain subjects be taught, no states mandate or evaluate specific home-school curricula.
Home-schoolers are a broad and diverse group with different motivations and instructional priorities, and this flexibility can benefit them. Some military families choose the option to provide stability for children who have to move to a different base every few years. A growing number of Black parents have chosen to home-school to teach children African American history and culture that is minimized or excluded from public schools.
But it can also provide an open door for extremist ideology and what Longoria-Green calls 鈥渨hite-supremacist-lite鈥� curriculum.
Here are three things to know about how home schooling operates in the United States, and how this incident connects to broader debates about public education today.
1. Home-schooling is not highly regulated
States set their own guidelines for home schooling, which vary widely. Only 13 states and D.C. require instructors to have qualifications, like a high school diploma, . Twenty-three states and D.C. have attendance requirements. Only two states require parents to undergo background checks before beginning home schooling.
鈥淥hio actually has more regulation than most states,鈥� said Longoria-Green. It to provide 900 hours of instruction, teach a list of specified subjects, and submit an assessment of students鈥� work.
In recent years, high-profile incidents of child abuse and death at the hands of home-school parents have rekindled debates over increasing safety regulations. Advocates of these stronger guardrails say that they鈥檙e necessary for child welfare and will only affect the small minority of homeschooling parents who are putting their children at risk. But opponents argue that these laws would stigmatize home-schoolers and facilitate government overreach.
One of these opponents to increased regulation is the Home School Legal Defense Association, an advocacy group founded in 1983 by Baptist minister Michael Farris. A 2015 outlined how the organization has blocked state legislation, such as bills that would have required parents to notify the state that they鈥檙e home-schooling or proposals to mandate that home-schooled students take assessments to demonstrate academic progress.
The HSLDA emerged out of a conservative Christian movement to expand homeschooling in the 1980s and 90s鈥� to Supreme Court decisions that fortified the separation of church and state in schools.
In a statement, HSLDA described the 鈥淒issident Homeschool鈥� group as an outlier.
鈥淭he repulsive beliefs and actions of one troubled and extreme fringe couple exploiting home-school freedom should not harm the liberty and parental rights of millions of American families who responsibly home school and who raise their children to be contributing members of society,鈥� it read. 鈥淚t would be a mistake to regulate the extraordinarily diverse home-schooling community鈥攎any of whom choose homeschooling to protect their children from racism鈥攂ased on the bad acts of a tiny fringe.鈥�
But Longoria-Green said that while explicit neo-Nazi ideology isn鈥檛 the norm, several home-schooling curricula .
Her organization advocates mandatory tests for home-schooled students. 鈥淭he assessment should be sufficient so that you can actually tell whether the children are receiving only an alternative version of reality in their home-schooling education,鈥� she said.
2. The home-school movement helped give birth to the parents鈥� rights rhetoric
The 鈥渉ome-school freedom鈥� that the HSLDA advocates is deeply intertwined with the parents鈥� rights movement that has swept through state legislatures over the past few years.
The and have both traced the connections between the conservative Christian wing of the home-schooling community and recent political efforts to give parents authority over what books are in kids鈥� classrooms and libraries, and what lessons they鈥檙e studying in public school.
Farris, the founder of HSLDA, is now the counselor to the CEO and president of Alliance Defending Freedom. The Arizona-based conservative legal advocacy group lists parents鈥� rights among its core issues, claiming that public schools are 鈥渋ndoctrinating students in harmful views of human sexuality and race, injecting ideas from critical race and critical gender theories into classrooms.鈥�
For a list of states that have put restrictions on how teachers can discuss race or sex in the classroom, or passed these parental rights laws, see below:
The map below shows which states have introduced bills or taken other steps that would restrict teaching critical race theory or limit how teachers can discuss racism and sexism.
It will be updated as new information becomes available.
Click here for more information on the measures and variations from state to state.
3. The Ohio news comes at a complicated time for Holocaust education
The lessons that the neo-Nazi group used are deeply hurtful to Holocaust survivors, and they misrepresent history, said Gretchen Skidmore, the director of education initiatives at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, in a statement.
鈥淚t is also dangerous,鈥� she said. 鈥淩ecent years have seen a rise in antisemitism鈥斺�攊n this country. It is important for students to understand the devastating consequences of the actions of Hitler and the Nazi party, along with their collaborators, during the Holocaust. Educational efforts should be focused on helping students understand the dangers of antisemitism and other forms of hatred and examining how and why the Holocaust happened.鈥�
At least 18 states require Holocaust and genocide education by law. The majority of that legislation passed after President Donald Trump took office and the country experienced a sharp increase in anti-Semitic acts, of data from the National Council of State Legislatures.
Still, educators and advocates are concerned about how recent legislation banning discussion of 鈥渄ivisive concepts鈥� in classrooms and mandating teachers to show both sides of 鈥渃ontroversial鈥� topics could interfere with accurate Holocaust education.
An Indiana state senator said that under a proposed bill, . In one Texas district, an administrator told teachers that they . Both later apologized for these comments.
In Ohio, where the homeschooling group is located, a state representative said students could learn about the Holocaust from varied perspectives, .
