In 1938, the practice of homeschooling was outlawed in Germany by Adolf Hitler and the infamous Third Reich. It was a rough period in German history, as thousands of young people were being pried from their parents’ direction and authority and drafted into the Hitler Youth program, where they were supposed to be trained as Aryan supermen (and women). In a few short years, vast numbers of these youth would be bleeding out on the battlefields of Europe, on the wrong side of the war for the soul of the world.
Sadly for freedom and for many families, Germany has never lifted this archaic and totalitarian ban on homeschooling. On the contrary, the German government seems to have stepped up its opposition to homeschooling over the past decade, forcing several families to flee, and others to enroll their children in state-approved schools against their will. The German Supreme Court has stated that the purpose of the homeschooling ban is to, “counteract the development of religious and philosophically motivated parallel societies.” It sounds like they aren’t really big on religious or philosophical diversity over there.
Some notable victims of this small-minded and grasping totalitarianism are Uwe and Hannelore Romeike and their five children. Uwe and his wife are music teachers and evangelical Christians who for years have been unsuccessfully seeking the right to homeschool their children. The Romeikes withdrew their children from German public schools in 2006, after becoming concerned that the educational material employed by the school was undermining the tenets of their Christian faith, and that the school was not providing their children with an ideal learning environment.
Read more in The Washington Times.
2 Comments. Leave new
Ah ah ah! I really must really laugh at you. Home schooling is forbidden all over Europe, Hitler has nothing to do with the ban, even if in Germany the ban was introduced by him. We set clear standards concerning children education. That is way we do not allow home schooling. Christian parents can send their children to Christian schools if they want to. But these have to have standardised curricula and comply with the minimum teaching standards set by the ministry of education. Among which – for example – creationism is not comprised.
Well, Marco, you clearly are NOT aware of the fact that homeschooled children here in the USA consistently out perform their public schooled peers on virtually every academic measure. I am baffled and saddened by the ignorance and bigotry of Euros like you. I suppose the people who wanted to be free and independent migrated to the US, leaving the obedient and easily led collectivists behind in the Motherlands. It is nice to know that you and other Euros are so good at doing what you are told, and thinking as you are told to think. Enjoy your statist utopia, Marco. I prefer to think outside of the box.