In Turpin aftermath, two California assembly members seek tighter homeschool regulations

In response to the extreme child abuse that allegedly occurred in David and Louise Turpin's Perris tract home, two legislators have proposed new legislation that will enhance data collection and accountability for California's homeschoolers.

California Assemblymember Jose Medina, of Riverside, and Assemblymember Susan Talamantes Eggman, of Stockton, have introduced two bills that would give the state more oversight of home schools – through enhanced curriculum requirements and health and safety inspections.

Both bills – AB 2756 and AB 2926 – are direct responses to the suffering of the so-called "homeschooled" Turpin children, whose parents are accused of imprisoning the 13 siblings in their home, where authorities say they were starved, chained to beds and beaten.

"The reason I authored the bill was the incident in Perris," Medina said. "I think it was clear that we don’t have a lot of information on homeschooling in the state of California."

Under current state law, homeschools fit under the umbrella of private schools. Under that designation, all private schools must provide details about the school by filing a Private School Affidavit Form. Medina's bill would create a special category for homeschools, prompting specific regulation.

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At the time of their discovery, several of the Turpin children, whose ages ranged from 2 to 29, were students at Sandcastle Day School, which was registered at the Turpin home address. Medina said its common for parents to register their homeschools under a name.

According to its Private School Affidavit Forms for the 2017-2018 school year, the Sandcastle Day School was a nonreligious, coeducational institution with an enrollment of five students and one full-time teacher. David Turpin, the father, is listed as the principal. The California Department of Education's records of the Turpins go back to the 2010-2011 school year when the family resided in a Murrieta home that also operated as City Day School where enrollment peaked at nine students before the relocation to Perris in the 2014-2015 school year. They were not eligible for inspection by the state.

Details that emerged from the Turpin investigation revealed a nightmarish environment. To prevent similar incidents, Medina and his colleagues are starting small through data collection.

"This would help provide disaggregate the information," said Kelly Reynolds, a spokesperson for Medina. If the new bill is passed, homeschools will be clearly listed as such on their Private School Affidavits. Reynolds added that the current affidavits are better suited for traditional and larger institutions.

"It makes it really hard to differentiate the types of programs," Reynolds said. "The affidavit is set up more as an institutional record than it is for homeschool."

More: Hundreds of journals found in home with 13 captive children

Medina's bill is one of the two assembly bills that will be heard by the Assembly Education Committee on April 25. The other, authored by Eggman, would require the state superintendent to establish an advisory committee dedicated to homeschooling. The committee's responsibilities would include but are not limited to health and safety inspections, setting certain curriculum standards and certifying and credentialing teachers.

The bill states that the committee will be "broadly representative and diverse." Eggman did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Critics of the bill, however, say the bill targets those who seek alternatives to a sub-par public school education.

"I think the current situation, the current laws that we have been in effect for a couple of decades, and they’ve been working just fine," said Pam Dowling, the president of the California Homeschool Network. She added that there is plenty of documentation already required for homeschoolers, including curriculum overview by school districts.

Dowling said she expects to be joined by 100 homeschooling advocates at a protest in Sacramento at the hearing in two weeks. The activism by the California Homeschool Network helped remove a piece of Medina's bill that would have required annual inspections by the fire marshal. Medina said he made this decision after listening to the privacy concerns of parents.

According to Dowling, even with this amendment, this proposed legislation is a misguided and disproportionate reaction to the Turpin case.

"We already have child abuse laws," she said. "It’s why the Turpins were arrested and are on trial."