When it comes to\u00a0homeschooling, Texas is as laissez-faire as they come. The Texas Education Agency, which oversees public schools, doesn\u2019t monitor\u00a0homeschool\u00a0programs.<\/p>\n
But that\u00a0wasn\u2019t\u00a0enough for\u00a0the\u00a0Texas\u00a0Legislature. Lawmakers\u00a0decided last year\u00a0to bar TEA and the State Board of Education from regulating homeschool programs.\u00a0Supporters of\u00a0the Homeschool Freedom Act\u00a0said it was\u00a0a\u00a0necessary\u00a0shield\u00a0against \u201cbureaucratic\u00a0overreach.\u201d<\/p>\n
We hope for\u00a0the sake of\u00a0children\u00a0that\u00a0legislators reconsider. The\u00a0Fort Worth-based\u00a0Texas Home Educators Sports Association, or THESA,\u00a0just made\u00a0the\u00a0case\u00a0for\u00a0oversight\u00a0after\u00a0knowingly employing\u00a0a registered sex offender<\/a>\u00a0to coach\u00a0baseball.<\/p>\n Watchkeep<\/a>, a website that tracks sexual abuse cases, was the first to report this month that\u00a0THESA\u00a0allowed Tommy Whiteman, a former player for the Houston Astros\u00a0organization,\u00a0to coach children. Whiteman was convicted\u00a016 years ago of online solicitation of a minor. According to his own account, Whiteman\u00a0was engaged in \u201cinappropriate conversations\u201d\u00a0with someone he thought was a 14-year-old but was\u00a0actually a\u00a0cop. Whiteman was arrested\u00a0and had to\u00a0register as a sex offender.<\/p>\n THESA, a faith-based group, asked\u00a0parents to review a document to allow Whiteman to coach, nodding only to \u201cthe dark shadows of sports.\u201d A screenshot of the document published by Watchkeep shows no\u00a0mention of Whiteman\u2019s sex offender status. THESA instead linked to a \u201ctestimony\u201d on the coach\u2019s website and asked parents to acknowledge reading it. Whiteman\u00a0wrote\u00a0about the sting that led to his arrest, but you\u00a0have to\u00a0read almost 1,000 words\u00a0into the narrative\u00a0to find out.<\/p>\n The coach might have been upfront about his past with THESA, but the homeschool association\u00a0wasn\u2019t\u00a0transparent with\u00a0families.\u00a0It took days of turmoil for the group to finally address the controversy in a letter to\u00a0parents.<\/p>\n To add to the public\u2019s concerns,\u00a0Southlake Carroll ISD\u00a0had Whiteman on a list of approved off-campus providers of athletic programs. The district said it was reviewing its protocols. We are still wondering what vetting\u00a0goes\u00a0after\u00a0a Carroll ISD\u00a0substitute teacher\u00a0was\u00a0arrested on sex trafficking allegations<\/a>\u00a0connected to her\u00a0previous\u00a0employment.<\/p>\n Whiteman has resigned from\u00a0THESA. In a statement, THESA told us there had been no reports of inappropriate behavior and that board members who approved his hire were no longer with the organization. Former Southlake Mayor John Huffman, who oversaw baseball for THESA, stepped down from the group\u2019s board.<\/p>\n THESA said police confirmed that Whiteman\u2019s coaching duties were \u201cin compliance with his current status.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Under Texas law, people convicted of violent sex offenses are not allowed to coach minors, but\u00a0online solicitation is not categorized as a violent crime.<\/p>\n Common sense\u00a0dictates\u00a0that a second chance\u00a0for\u00a0a sex offender\u00a0can\u2019t\u00a0involve\u00a0access to children.\u00a0A public school that knowingly hired a registered sex offender would\u00a0have a lot of explaining to do.\u00a0<\/p>\n But in Texas, groups like THESA\u00a0answer to\u00a0no one.\u00a0<\/p>\n Have thoughts about this?\u00a0Send a letter to the editor\u00a0using our letters form<\/a>\u00a0or email\u00a0letters@dallasnews.com<\/a>. Letters should be no more than 200 words and include the first and last name of the writer and city of residence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When it comes to\u00a0homeschooling, Texas is as laissez-faire as they come. The Texas Education Agency, which oversees public…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":272690,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[101279,5513,47702,1923,27,2810,29,293,28,101280,101278],"class_list":["post-272689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-homeschool-programs","tag-houston-astros","tag-registered-sex-offender","tag-sex-offender","tag-texas","tag-texas-education-agency","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-legislature","tag-texas-news","tag-thesa","tag-tommy-whiteman"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272689"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272689\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/272690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}