Let's help homeschoolers in Sweden!

As you may already know, the right to homeschool in Sweden is being threatened by proposed legislation. If the law being voted on in June goes through, it will be virtually illegal to homeschool in Sweden. Specifically, families who wish to homeschool will have to prove that they are doing so due to "extraordinary circumstances" -- that is, health or travel reasons. The proposed law argues that "there is no need for the law to offer the possibility of home education because of religious or philosophical reasons in the family."

You can read more in English about this legislation and what's being done to fight it here:
 
http://www.rohus.nu/en/
 
Several issues ago, I ran an article about homeschooling in Sweden. I thought it would be fun and educational to talk to homeschoolers all over the world, and was lucky enough to be able to interview a couple of Swedish homeschoolers. That article is posted, free to read in full, on the magazine's web site:
 
http://www.secular-homeschooling.com/006/sweden.html
 
Just a couple of months after this article came out, I heard the bad news from Jenny Lantz, one of the parents I'd interviewed and a homeschooling activist. I was outraged and indignant. As I think my article makes fairly clear, homeschooling in Sweden is hard enough under the existing laws. At most, a couple of hundred families in Sweden homeschool -- and that's the biggest number I've been able to find, out of a country of nine million people.

I wrote an article about the proposed legislation and sent some copies to Jenny. She said that it might help if she could show the government that the eyes of the international homeschooling community were on the unfolding events. She also thought that the fact the magazine was called SECULAR Homeschooling might be an advantage, since in Sweden homeschooling is associated with religious extremism in the minds of the mainstream population.

Recently I got in touch with Jenny, asking if there'd been any news. Her reply sounded dejected. There was no news, no change to the proposed legislation, and no reason to think it wouldn't go through.

Feeling helpless, and guilty about my own freedom to homeschool, I asked if there was anything I could do to help. Perhaps a letter-writing campaign? Maybe if a lot of secular homeschoolers got in touch with Swedish politicians, it might help alleviate the fears that were obviously fueling this legislation.

Jenny and the group she works with really liked that idea. She gave me a lot of information on who to contact, and we talked a bit about the best way to go about this.

First, we're looking for stories from secular homeschoolers -- that is, those who are homeschooling (regardless of their personal beliefs) for reasons that aren't religious. We'll be getting in touch with people who simply may not realize that there are non-religious reasons to homeschool. We need to educate them.

It's crucial that our letters be polite. We're trying to persuade people over whom we have no political power to please reconsider what they're doing. We're also writing from a country that has a reputation for thinking it knows what's best for everyone. The last thing we want is to come across as angry, insulting, or condescending.

This is the hardest one for me: aim to be as concise as possible. Homeschooling is a topic we all have a lot to say about, but shorter letters have a better chance of being read.

Thankfully, it's more common than not for Swedes to be multilingual; but English is not the first language of the people we're writing to, and the English they speak and read is likely to be closer to British than American. We need to keep idiomatic phrases to a bare minimum.

Because of this, and because we're representing homeschooling, spelling, grammar, and punctuation should be beautiful. If I can be of help, my proofreading services are at the beck and call of anyone who wants them. You're also very welcome to post the letter you're thinking of sending as a comment here and asking if anyone has anything to say about it. You can also post to let us know that you've sent an email, and to whom, and what it says. I would love to be able to pass along encouraging news to Jenny Lantz and her fellow homeschoolers.

If you intend to send one letter to many people, please make sure it's appropriate for everyone you're sending it to. Jenny has given us a fairly diverse list of people. It might be more effective to send one or two emails tailored to the political and philosophical views of the politicians in question.

So far as content and tone are concerned, we want to be pro-homeschooling rather than anti-school. We also want to address the fears of those we hope to persuade. They're afraid that homeschooled children won't get an adequate education, and won't be an integrated part of the Swedish community. They're undoubtedly concerned about "socialization" -- in every sense of the word. (This is Sweden, after all.) If your child participates in school athletic or other activities, this would be wonderful to mention. If he or she is a Scout, a volunteer of some sort, or takes classes through the local community college, these would also be excellent points to bring up.

We are trying to put a human face on homeschooling. The proposed law is seen by politicians as impacting a group. We need to make it clear that these are families who stand to be hurt. If the reason you homeschool is similar to those of one of the families mentioned in the SHM article, perhaps you might mention that, and mention the parent by name.

Don't worry if someone posts something here that is very similar to what you were going to write. Originality isn't the real concern. We just want both the politicians and the Swedish homeschooling community to know that we're here and we care.

And now I'll give the floor to Jenny Lantz, with many thanks for the work she's done and the chance she's giving us to make a difference:
 
Our minister of education, the one in charge of the new school law, claims to be liberal and speaks a lot about freedom:
Jan Björklund <jan.bjorklund@liberal.se>
Jan Björklund <jan.bjorklund@education.ministry.se>
 
At his office, as an expert in school politics, there's also:
Fredric Skälstad <fredric.skalstad@education.ministry.se>
 
Our prime minister (conservative):
Fredrik Reinfeldt <registrator@primeminister.ministry.se>
 
The other parties' spokespersons in school politics:
Vänsterpartiet -- the socialists
Rossanna Dinamarca
rossana.dinamarca@riksdagen.se
 
Socialdemokraterna -- social democrats
Marie Granlund
marie.granlund@riksdagen.se
 
Miljöpartiet -- the environmental party
Mats Pertoft
mats.pertoft@riksdagen.se
 
Folkpartiet -- the liberals
Fredrik Malm
fredrik.malm@riksdagen.se
 
Centerpartiet -- the centre party
Sofia Larsen
sofia.larsen@riksdagen.se
 
Moderaterna -- the conservatives
Margareta Pålsson
margareta.palsson@riksdagen.se
 
Kristdemokraterna -- the Christian party
Gunilla Tjernberg
gunilla.tjernberg@riksdagen.se
 
The government presented this law to the parliament the other day, and the parliament will vote about it in June. A few weeks before that could be a good idea to send the members of the parliament emails too, but right now these are the important ones.

We are really thankful that you want to help!!! We feel really strengthened by all the international support we have!