As taxpayers and parents of school-aged students, Arizona should award these home school families the same special education services as any other taxpaying parent. The Arizona State Constitution provides education as a fundamental right. The constitution, by its provisions, assures to every child a basic education. The State clearly delineates that basic educational benefits, including special education services, are a right of Arizona students without regard to their mode of instruction, whether public, private, charter or home school. Arizona offers special needs services to a plethora of students already .
Home schooled students are the only student group excluded from special education services.
Most insurance companies do not cover or are reluctant to cover special needs services. Because the schools first classified these services as educational needs, insurance companies hesitate to call them medical necessities. Because home school students have been excluded from these services, they have to pay for them out of their own pockets. In another case, the special needs services for a home schooled blind child was so expensive, the family could not afford them at all. As the children of taxpayers and Arizona citizens, home educated students with special needs deserve the same services as any other special needs students in Arizona, and should not be discriminated against because of their parents school choice.