TargetTalk

here is the question about public school shooting teams and kids who are home schooled and why they will not let them shoot on there school shooting teams..

i know a kid that got the drive and know how to make to the top of the of air rifle olympic shooting sport but he homeschooled and none of the local teams can pick him up as a shooter because of the fact of the homeschooling and some school the rule that you have to be going to the school to be on any school sports team ..

his parents let him take a test for the grade that he would be in and he blew the test scores off the chart for his age group .he would be in the 8th grade if he was in school now along with could be bumped up in grade level to about beening in the 10th grade level of high school ..he really wants to be on a rifle team to shoot but his parents are a little leary of letting him go to a public school for they feel that the public schools do not teach what is really need in way of basic book learning as they call it ..the kid is smart as a whip and can really fool you when talking to him about history and tody events he is very well behaved and good all around kid ..i would just like to see him and a couple more kids get ahead in our sport

the only other thing is a really nice private school that cost a whole lot of money to go to but they do have a rifle team ..the private school is trying to tell the parents that if comes there it will no money for the cost of the school and they will help with the unifroms along with cost of him liveing on campus there ..for the kids stay on a campus dorm dureing school year and come home dureing off season ,plus they will help him find a part time job around the school to help with pocket money ..

this also is a little bit of a rant to blow off stream for i see kids like him a lot in the home schooling that a lot of family do and they are the kids that have the drive and know how to get to the top of the what ever sport that they get into and it makes you a little mad about some of the rules when it comes to the school sports programs out there ..

Hank, this is clearly a matter of state and local law and regulations. There is no national policy. In Wyoming home schooled children are allowed to compete on school teams. OTOH, nowhere in Wyoming that I know of do they have shooting as part of school sports. In Wyoming all shooting programs are done through 4-H or the NRA. Isabel

Hank .. as Isabel1130 said ... it varies from state to state. Here in New Mexico it is possible, but kind of convoluted, after some disappointing situations here, I decided that it was not worth getting the kids into the HS just for the sports aspect.

I have three daughters that shoot ... all were homeschooled in grades 2 thru 8, and then we have them in a "distance learning" high school for grades 9-12. (We use OU High School, but U-Nebraska has a great program too ... one of my shooters is in the UNHS program)

My solution was to volunteer in the 4-H program, get my coach certs, and start coaching the kids on a team of their own. We, pretty much, here in NM compete directly against the "normal" High School programs (all JROTC) in the large state events. Of course, there are JROTC only events, but the folks have tried (at least in NM) to make those events as few as possible. Yes ... there are some very parochial thinking areas south of us, but except for that area the CMP 3-P program is open to all.

VC4HSS hosts a fall CMP cup match as well as hosting the International JO qualifiers (3 major matches).
JROTC schools host NRA Sectionals, the 3-P JO qualifiers as well as a spring CMP Cup match that serves also as the State Championship (4 major matches).
These events are open to >>ALL<< junior shooters whether they are in clubs or not .... our cup matches we pull in clubs/shooters from all the adjacent states (AZ, UT, CO, OK, & TX).

In order for all this to begin to work, we all use the same safety programs based on the JROTC JMIC program. That way they know we are all running on the same page there.

Yes, there are more opportunities, especially to a JROTC shooter, to compete in major out of state matches ... but, by taking the horns yourself and hosting some of the 10m Air matches in your state, you can get your kids enough match time for them to succeed too.

One area that we have the "advantage" over high school programs is in smallbore rifle ... These programs are essentially shut down in all but a few states. We try hard here in NM to get those HS shooters that do not have that opportunity to come and shoot the smallbore matches with us. This year we have a talented High School athlete, that came in, borrowed a rifle and was invited in the 1st round to the INTL JO championship in April ... in smallbore ... she missed the cut in air. One of her teammates just missed the cut, but I expect her to get a 2nd round invite in March.
If these shooters want to shoot the smallbore rifle year round, we try and get them into a 4-H club near where they live, and then we can do a whole lot more.

Do the 4-H & JROTC leaders bump heads .... yes occasionally, but we have made great efforts to keep the programs running side by side and include each other as much as we can in our events. My program was started with lots of help and advice from our nearby JROTC (high school) programs

last night we haveing drinner with friends and one of the guys is part of the high school distict sports team program and we where talking about the home school kids and how the game is played with them about beening home schooled and local school sports program and he was just like me very mad about how the system works againest these kids for some of the socalled home schooled kids in the diff school disticts area are blowning the scores off the school test and they are great kids who has the skill and the drive to make to the top of what ever sport that they go into and like me he seen the great talent that they kids have and he can not get them into the school programs in the area and he feel that the schools are the one loseing out on this kids instead of the kids loseing out on the schools ..

we put my stepdaughter into public school this year to let her shoot on a school rifle team ..
one of her 6th grade teachers called us in and told us she was not trying hard enough in class but she getting a saight a in the class..i looked over the work the teacher was handing out and i started to laugh and the teacher as me what was so funny ..i told her she had two years ago that way she not trying hard enough ..i had to explain to the nice teacher we had her doing 8th and 9th grade school work at home and she has to be pushed to be able to get her to go ..and we have doing some college level work also so you have to be able to keep up with her .. the funny thing it is math that she is tearing up the class by not really studying for she allready had the class in..


it seam a not lot of fairness to the home schooled kids out there when it comes to way the school sports programs are beening handle ..that all we are in the middle of talking about leting her go to the private school next year to let her get the schooling and be able to get into the school sports programs and maybe let a college level coachs see her also

like i said last night it more a blowing off stream post than anything else .for i really do see this kids are the future of our shooting sports programs here in the states..

There's a strong bias in some states and/or school districts against home schooling. CA would apparently like to eliminate it. One way to discourage it is through behaviors like these. There's no good reason not to allow home-schooled kids to participate in public school team sports. They can't argue that it's about resources, since you're paying the school taxes anyway and not getting anything to show for it. In fact, in the interests of "fairness" homeschooled kids should get first crack at extracurricular resources, since they're not consuming any of the regular curricular resources.

One of the best sources of information & help is the HSLDA .... I think that if you are home-schooling your kids you should join this association ... if nothing else for the information they can provide.

HSLDA = Home School Legal Defense Association

With respect to all who posted to this link, the lack of shooting (or any other sports program) in the public schools is about one thing and one thing only - Money. Every program in my district is under enormous pressure to justify itself, and this means academic as well as extracirricular programs. We've got young parents advocating for 4K kindergarten, band parents want more band time, arts boosters want more art classes and theater. Transportation costs (bussing) continue to increase. In sports we've got freshman, JV and varsity level teams for all the major sports, for both boys and girls. We've had to eliminate gymnastics for boys. The teachers want raises every year, and their health insurance costs continue to rise. I could go on and on, but you get the picture.

Bottom line: sign your kids up with a local private sportsmans club or 4H group. You are not going to force shooting into the schools. Again, it has nothing to do with home schooling, so don't pretend you are a victim here. It's about money. Period.

Here in the DC area we have the Potomac High School Rifle League.

We have 1 team, called the Mavericks, that is a pick up team for kids who's school does not have a rifle team.

They get stuck with me as their coach.

We are considered a non-conference team and cannot win the regional championships. But otherwise we compete with the rest of the league in regular matches.

To GUEST who posted "It's all about money"

I think you missed the point. The point is:
1) Some school districts have shooting programs
&
2) They are reluctant/unwilling to let homeschoolers in

A) Some of these districts/states just don't allow it - that's OK, they wouldn't get my vote on any bond issues they raise
B) Some don't know they can let homeschoolers in & need to be educated ... here you have to educate yourself on what is allowed
C) Some just want to make it difficult ... most times a letter from HSLDA fixes that

In these instances it is not about money.


Where it is just about money and they do not have a program, I agree ... find a 4-H program or volunteer & start your own.

Money is there for shooting programs ... chat with your local Friends of NRA area/district rep

I can kind of see the learyness of district authorities in that they are inter-school competitions, so should be testing which school has the better shooters. If they're going to let people onto sports teams who are not members of the school, it needs to be tightly controlled to ensure schools aren't pulling doppelgangers.
On the otherhand, if he's demonstrably homeschooled, and demonstrably within the school's catchment such that he would otherwise be at that school, I don't see where the problem is.


hank2222 - Even if it is a situation like B or C that jhmartin listed where it's either ignorance or awkwardness on the part of the school, have they checked out local 4H programmes or just generally the local clubs?
Are they sure that the school is offering the best junior shooting programme locally?

In the UK, Scout and school shooting teams fall into two categories
a. those with coaches who shoot and have come to the school/scout group with a lot of background shooting knowledge
b. those with well-meaning teachers/leaders who have taken a very basic youth shooting programme leader's course which is just about enough to let them run an air range safely.

In the case of b, good on those teachers/leaders for trying to get people into the sport, but if as a junior you have ambitions to get better, the only way to go is to find a local club with experienced coaches who can actually help you improve, instead of just supervising as you poke at a target week after week with a very basic course book for guidance.

Seems like they've jumped at the school because it has a team. Within their striking distance though, does it have the best team or the best coaches? Especially if the school is going to be difficult, it's worth checking if there are other options that would be be easier and better for his development as a shooter.