When Poland was devoured by its German and Soviet neighbors in 1939, the school system officially stopped functioning. The home became the underground seat of learning for more than a million young Poles. In 21st century Poland, some Poles still learn underground, although their war is different.
Throughout World War II, most Polish schools and universities were liquidated, and thousands of teachers were executed or sent to gulags and concentration camps. Polish children had clandestine lessons in very tiny rooms two or three times a week. Material was scarce, since the Nazis burned Polish books. Education would have ceased altogether without the desire and dedication of parents and students, who worked hard with teachers to keep their lessons secret and risked imprisonment or death if discovered. Underground teaching existed elsewhere in occupied Europe, for example in Norway or Yugoslavia, but nowhere to the same extent as in Poland.
Unfortunately, home-schooling is still largely underground in post-communist occupied Poland.
Parents
often prefer to remain anonymous out of fear from state harassment or prying
neighbors. Today's fight for the right to home-school is an uphill battle
against government interference and a strong dose of post-communist red tape.
Recently,
the movement has received publicity not only in educational publications, but
also in the mainstream media. Home-schoolers have created Web sites (www.edukacjadomowa.pl, www.edukacjadomowa.piasta.pl)
and the Internet has become a forum for lively debates involving parents,
teachers and school administrators. The first home-schooling association is
being established - Stowarzyszenie Edukacji Domowej - and in 2003 the first
national conference was held, with another scheduled for Spring 2005. The first
book appeared dealing exclusively with home-schooling, Marek Budajczak's
"Edukacja domowa," published in 2003 to critical acclaim. In
September 2004, the first Christian school to serve as an umbrella for
home-schoolers opened in
When
communism fell in 1989, the political environment seemed conducive to
home-based education. "In 1991 the first post-communist Polish Parliament
passed the Educational System Act, which enabled parents to ask school
principals for permission to teach their children at home," Budajczak
explained. "But the Ministry of National Education soon persuaded members
of parliament to introduce changes to the 'much too liberal' home-schooling
laws."
Government
authorities and school principals now have the discretion to make any demand
they want on parents before granting them the right to home-school. Principals'
decisions are absolute and unchallengeable. In addition, "every
home-taught student is required to pass non-standardized school exams at least once
a year, even though no school student does so," Budajczak said.
The
movement is small but growing. An estimated 20 Polish families teach their
children at home. Since freedom in education speaks English, many of these
parents have read English language books on home-based education. The most
famous Polish home-schooler is Budajczak, a PhD and father of two teenagers,
who was inspired by a book he read ten years ago.
"We
would have never started (home-schooling) if I hadn't read two books by Prof.
Roland Meighan about British experiences," he said. Other Poles cite
authors Glenn Doman and Milton Friedman as influences in their decisions. It is
possible that more Poles teach at home in Anglophone countries than in
Home-schooling's
success in the
"The
most important challenges for the near future of the Polish home-schooling
movement are creating a support network, and improving legal conditions,"
Budajczak said. The latter need may require legal battles to defend the rights
of parents to teach their children free of government coercion and meddling.
Although
the European Union has regulated everything from cucumber size to bovine
copulation, Eurocrats have not yet addressed the issue of home-schooling. It is
possible that Union regulations will take their cue from German law, said
Richard Guenther, director of a German home-schooling legal defense group,
Schulunterricht zu Hause. If this is the case, the future of home-schooling in
Europe looks bleak indeed, since a month ago seven German fathers were
sentenced to prison merely for teaching their children at home.
Guenther,
who has been working for years with the European Center for Law and Justice in
Strasbourg, has offered legal assistance to Polish families willing to present their
cases in European Court. American home-school advocate Chris Klicka has also
offered help and support for Poles. The results of the struggle are important
not only for the Europeans but for Americans living in the Old World and hoping
to educate their children freely. So let's hope educational freedom can ring in
Poland and elsewhere.
Natalia
Dueholm is a journalist in Poland.
