A 10-year-old homeschool girl described as "well liked, social and interactive with her peers, academically promising and intellectually at or superior to grade level" has been told by a New Hampshire court official to attend a government school because she was too "vigorous" in defense of her Christian faith.
UPDATE 3/17/11: Supreme Court rules against parents, saying that the girl needed to be exposed to "perspectives" other than the Christian teaching she experienced at home.
UPDATE 1/6/11: Case now before the New Hampshire Supreme Court
UPDATE 11/25/09: Hearing scheduled in government court
UPDATE 9/1/09: Story shakes nation -- threat to freedom of religion and parental rights
-- From "NH mother wants to continue home-schooling" Associated Press 8/27/09
A religious freedom group has taken up the cause of a New Hampshire mother who wants to keep home-schooling her daughter.
The Alliance Defense Fund has asked a family court judge to reconsider a decision last month that sends the 10-year-old daughter of Brenda Voydatch to a public school in Meredith.
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From "Court orders Christian child into government education" by Bob Unruh © 2009 WorldNetDaily 8/28/09
The decision from Marital Master Michael Garner reasoned that the girl's "vigorous defense of her religious beliefs to [her] counselor suggests strongly that she has not had the opportunity to seriously consider any other point of view."
The recommendation was approved by Judge Lucinda V. Sadler, but it is being challenged by attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund, who said it was "a step too far" for any court.
The ADF confirmed today it has filed motions with the court seeking reconsideration of the order and a stay of the decision sending the 10-year-old student [Amanda Kurowski] in government-run schools in Meredith, N.H.
The dispute arose as part of a modification of a parenting plan for the girl. The parents divorced in 1999 when she was a newborn, and the mother has homeschooled her daughter since first grade with texts that meet all state standards.
But during the process of negotiating the terms of the plan, a guardian ad litem appointed to participate concluded the girl "appeared to reflect her mother's rigidity on questions of faith" and that the girl's interests "would be best served by exposure to a public school setting" and "different points of view at a time when she must begin to critically evaluate multiple systems of belief ... in order to select, as a young adult, which of those systems will best suit her own needs."
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