Ed Emery: Most would question whether Missouri is doing a good job educating our children

(From Sen. Ed Emery, R-Lamar)

Amid the routine and often predictable proceedings of the Missouri State Senate, every now and then, something remarkable happens.

A recent hearing conducted by the Senate Education Committee was one of those occasions. The committee was soliciting testimony on Senate Bill 875, a measure that would prevent the state high school activities board from excluding homeschool students from extracurricular activities. The highlight of the presentation was the appearance of three remarkable young men.

Brothers Ezekiel and Jonah Spieker and another home-educated youth, Xie Ferguson, testified with poise and persuasion regarding their desire to be allowed to participate in after-school activities, such as band, theater and athletics. 

Participation in non-academic programs is regulated by the Missouri State High School Activities Association, an unelected organization. MSHSAA limits eligibility for extracurricular activities to “bona fide” students. To compete in athletics or participate in debate or choirs, non-traditional students must be enrolled at a member school for 80 percent of the school day. In other words, a student can only be a little bit homeschooled.

Senate Bill 875 seeks to change this by denying funding to any school district that excludes homeschool students. I wish everyone could have seen and heard these remarkable young men testify. They advocated for inclusion with professionalism. 

They were well-prepared, and spoke articulately of the value of extracurricular activities and the reasons why homeschool students should be allowed to participate. There was not a single witness in opposition to the bill, though one witness attempted to justify the 80 percent enrollment requirement, saying that schools need to judge the character of non-traditional students. 

The irony of his comment, which followed the powerful presentation from the homeschool students, was likely not lost on anyone in the room. In my opinion, they were the epitome of character, and could surely serve as a positive example for many children attending our public schools.

The Senate had another opportunity to consider public education recently as the Gubernatorial Appointments Committee reviewed the governor’s selection to fill a seat on the State Board of Education. Pamela Westbrooks-Hodge is a highly educated and experienced professional and I’m confident she will serve the state board well. But as she appeared before the committee, I used the occasion to encourage her to consider alternatives to traditional education options and expand the choices available to students and parents.

During her confirmation hearing, she was presented a brief survey of Missouri’s educational landscape. According to the statewide report card published on the website of the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, just 41 percent of Missouri eighth-graders scored proficient or above in math on the National Assessment of Educational Progress in 2019.

Reading performance was not much better. In 2016, just 22 percent of Missouri High School seniors met the ACT benchmarks for college readiness in the four tested areas. DESE expresses pride in Missouri’s 90 percent on-time high school graduation rate, but downplays the fact that only 43 percent of high school graduates are “college or career ready” by the agency’s own standards.

Those are the statistics our state board of education has to wrestle with. Most would question whether Missouri is doing a good job educating our children, and yet the leaders of our public school education system seem content with the status quo. This promising new member of the Board of Education was asked to consider these disturbing numbers and look at what other states have done. Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana and a number of other states have expanded educational choices for parents and have seen significant improvements in outcomes. They’re doing things that we should consider in Missouri.

Again, Ms. Westbrooks-Hodge is a capable individual and I trust she will be an outstanding addition to the school board. As a former member of the governing board for the troubled Normandy School District, she knows all too well the challenges of educating children. She publicly committed to being open-minded to the things that other states have done and to consider why we can’t try similar things in Missouri. I believe she will take the challenge seriously.