German homeschooler needs your help.

Here is the story of Melissa Busekros, a 16 year old girl, who has been ripped from her family and placed in a child psych ward.

Here is the list to write or call to protest.

I have found an address to write Melissa directly.
Melissa Busekros
Klinikum Nürnberg-NordHaus 48 B
Prof.-Ernst-Nathan-Str. 1
D-90419 Nürnberg
Germany/Deutschland

Here is where I got it from:
http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/sheilalange/280578/address+for+Melissa.html

Bill Number S.CON.RES.2

Bill Number S.CON.RES.2

Opposition to all these non-binding agreements that just tell the enemy that we are leaving soon. You can have the hold things.


It IS NOT in our interest to create chaos, leave the country in upheaval, and expect a weak and fledgling government to do what we lack the will to do. It IS OUR DUTY to secure the peace from the violence we have spawned.

I will send off an email later tonight.

Home Education in Britian

Seeing I am in Europe, I try to keep up-to-date on what is going on here. The has been a growing concern here because of the movements of the government in the UK. I am going to just reprint what is going on in many blogs. The part where we get to what can you do. I think if they can get most HEor's(Home Educator's) to respond the government will know it will have an up hill battle, so I think publishing this is a good idea. We can always pray. Then, we can also write and email news agencies. I do not agree with calling or email government officials unless they are your own. So here is the situtation:



a) The DfES is in charge of .......
b) They are planning .......
c) There is a man proposing.....
d) To keep home education alive you need to email/write to.......and say..

So, consider these answers a starting point:

a) The Department for Education and Skills is the government department that is responsible for developing strategies in education. They see part of their remit as aiming to achieve excellence for all and their functions will accord with the Every Child Matters agenda.

b) Following last year's DfES consultation on draft local authority Home Education guidelines, (which many HEors felt did not adequately or fairly represent the views of a large portion of the HE community, and even DfES admit was "targetted"), the DfES intend to conduct another consultation on Elective Home Education. They describe the proposed consultation as being "a full one, conducted via the Department's consultation website.".. where they hope to ensure that the documents are accessible to as many people as possible.

c) Put simply, it appears that the DfES is considering using the Every Child Matters Agenda to insist that home educators conform to standards as decided by the state. This will doubtless mean that they would like to impose a system of routine monitoring to assess progress. It would also, in all probability, mean that they would like to intervene in the matter of educational content, either explicitly through the imposition of a curriculum or through the method of punitive monitoring. DfES's complaints with the current system is that whilst schools are subject to close inspection, home educators appear to get away with it and that "whilst s437 of the Education Act 1996 provides a remedy for LAs which have concerns that there may be no suitable provision, this is unwieldy, time consuming and expensive and in some cases will be nugatory where home educators are making good provision but are resistant to LA enquiries."

d) To keep Home Education as we know and love it,


1. Write to Elaine Haste of the Elective Home Education Department (DfES) at info@dfes.gsi.gov.uk and ask to be included on a list of those who receive information about the consultation.

Ssample letter/email to DFES :
"I am a home educating parent. I understand that there is to be a DFES consultation about light touch changes to the "monitoring" of home educated children. Please keep me informed of any further developments with regard to this consultation. Yours sincerely"
info@dfes.gsi.gov.uk
Elaine.HASTE@dfes.gsi.gov.uk
Elaine Haste
Elective Home Education
DfES
Mowden Hall,
Darlington
DL3 9BG.

NB: This does NOT mean that you have taken part in the consultation and the DfES cannot honestly claim that you have. The reason why this last point is important is that HEors who are experienced in the area of government consultations are rightfully cynical about the uses to which these exercises are put. On previous occasions, HEors have found that they may as well have been shouting at the moon, since their views were not adequately or fairly represented in any conclusions or practice, though the DfES nonetheless was able to band it about that they had consulted us. So why bother signing up now if we don't plan to actually take part in the consultation? Signing up is important because the DfES needs to know just how many of us they are going to have to deal with. They need to realise just how many of us will resist changes in a serious way. If the powers that be think that they currently have significant problems with the dealing with HEors under the present legislation, they need to realise just how many more problems they are going to have should they change the situation in the way they appear to intend. This will only happen if the numbers of us who look as if we are going to be resistant to change really stack up.


2. Spread awareness. Send this post (or improved version) anywhere you think helpful. Tell at least 4 other HEors what is going on and get them to sign up, as above. Get them to tell at least 4 others. Put this on Local HE Lists everywhere. Blog the story if you have an HE or any other kind of blog. Use this explanation there if you don't have the time to re-write it fully. Every one of us counts.


3. Spread the positive word about home education (personalised learning, healthy happy children etc) possibly using the recent media stuff about "toxic childhood". This would be the "battle of hearts n minds" stuff.


4. If you are a member of Education Otherwise you might want to communicate your feelings to the EO Government Policy Group (governmentpolicy@education-otherwise.org) about what you would ideally like EO to be doing about all this. You could also speak to your Local Contact. If you are a member of any other home education support organisation (or you know anyone who is) please pass on general information about the forthcoming DFES consultation.


5. If you have any energy left, I would also write to your MP, whose seat will doubtless be a much more marginal than it has been for years. Tell her/him, for example, that you don't want your private family life invaded, that should the situation change and HEors be told what to do, you believe that changes will lead to a challenge in the law that holds that parents should be responsible for the education of their children.

Virtual Talmund

Of Love and Torah is a post I was reading on Beliefnet in arguelment with another post called A Slippery Slope to Idolatry .

I am not buying her arguement for the kissing of the Scroll as that it is all God has left us. If God is alive then the is always hear or touch him again. As a born-again believer, I am glad I do not have to think this way. God is always with me. Yes, he has given me His Word, but there are many things I do not know. There are times my bible is not with me. God can always speak to me directly. How can you ever expect to hear from God if you think all you have left of Him is something He had written.

Luis Posada Carriles

Hugo Chavez, president of Venezuela, went all hog wild about the US and the The Devil, aka Bush.
Luis Posada Carriles is a 77 year old bad man who is sitting in jail waiting to be deported, but the States can't find anyone they like to deport him to. The way Chavez went on about him you would think he was having a good old time running a 7-11 or something. The man is insane calling Bush a "Yankee". I don't care were he went to school Bush ain't no Yankee.
I also agree with Goldberg advice to Bolton.

Creation

I post a comment on Dare to Know's blog.
Here is the complete answer.

Yes, I do believe that God(elohiym) created the heavens and the earth, but not in the way it is taught.

Gen 1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

Gen 1:2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness [was] upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

The words without form is the Hebrew word tohuw . It is also found in Isa 45:18, translated vain.

Isa 45:18 For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I [am] the LORD; and [there is] none else.

So if God did not create it that way something must have happenned inbetween verse 1 and 2 to cause the world to be tohuw.

Ok let's cut to the chase. Most people believe in a 7 day creation. I do not believe that and do not believe the Word of God supports that. Genesis 1:1 uses the word create(bara). God does not use the word again till the 4th day where he created(bara) great whale. I know we have all learn on the first day God created, but it does not say that.

Gen 1:3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

Now to answer DTK's question.

Gen 1:28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

How can you replenish something that has not been plenished before. I believe everything they find fall in the first heaven and earth. Animals and man that are now are different than what was then. I believe the life that is now, the life that leaves the body when it is dead is different from that what which was before.

Talk Like a Pirate Day

I nows bees called Bloody Lucy Straw and i cans bees found on die Sad Serpent.
Arrrr.

Deutsch Welle article(in english)

DW has an article about homeschoolers in German. After the article there is a space to send them your commensts.

Please, please, please send in a comment. Even if it is just a couple of lines.



Below is the letter I sent in:



I am an American living in Germany. I am married to a German and have three children. I wish they allowed homeschooling here. It would give us so much flexablity. Homeschooling for the government is not about what is best for the child, but about control.
For instance, the eight year old Timo G., 100% handicapped, who has been learning at home for awhile at to the recommendation of his medical specialists. This should come to an end, the responsible leader of the Local Education Authority decided. Timo must be driven daily to a special education school which is 75 miles from home, despite the fact that several medical opinions proved that this travel and the separation from his known environment would disturb the development of the boy massively. As the family does not accept this verdict, the authorities are now threatening to remove custody.The system does not take into consideration a slower child or even a gifted child. A child may excel at Math, but have problems with German. The child fails to keep up with other in one subject, but is bored in another. Homeschooling parents, like other parents, only want what is best for their child.
The system is not fluid enough to deal with changes in a child's life. Like two grandparents dieing within weeks of each other. The child does not have time to grieve, he must perform he is in the fourth class and if he does not he will end up in the lower schools.
Do I want control? Yes, I do, but I share the brunt of the responsiblity for my child. I do not have learn every year my children's strengths and weakness. I do not have to figure out how to challenge 33 children individually. I only have 3.