Correction on education podcast/Non-member writes in to LDS Liberty, likes our Church/Benjamin Netenyahu’s Speech and Prophecies about the Jews/Land zoning issues with Phoenix Temple/November will be a busy month for LDS Liberty.
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Hey, guys! Thanks for the invitation to write in with questions about the Free State Project. We are living overseas at the moment, and are not sure how long we will be here, so I can’t “officially” join by signing the notice of intent. However, I do have a commitment from my husband that we can relocate to New Hampshire when we do head back to the States. It works well for us, since my side of the family is just over the line in Massachusetts, so it’s like I get the Massachusetts climate I’m used to from my childhood, without the Massachusetts tax-burden and nanny laws. Brilliant! To top it off, New Hampshire is one of the most beautiful places on earth, with tons of outdoor activities available all over the state. Can’t complain about that!
Anyway, on to my Free State questions:
1. How many LDS church members are there in New Hampshire? How many stakes and wards and such? (I ask out of curiosity. It’s not a make-or-break question. Aside from the decade I was in Arizona, I’ve always lived where being LDS has made me an odd-ball!) Do the church members there seem more liberty minded than in other areas you may have lived or know about, or do they look at you cross-eyed when you start talking about liberty issues?
2. As a homeschooling parent, I’m concerned by how much extra work the parents have to do to homeschool their children in New Hampshire. For comparison, when we were in Arizona, all we had to do is let the Department of Education know we were homeschooling, and then we were free to do that however we wanted. In New Hampshire, parents have to put together a portfolio and have it checked at the end of the year by a state sanctioned authority and run the risk of having their kids put into public school against parental wishes if they are not considered to be up to snuff. I’m not worried about my children not being able to show appropriate progress, but I am still opposed to this requirement in principle. Are you aware of any work being done to remove this burden from homeschooling families?
3. I was on Wikipedia the other day, looking up information on the Free State Project and found out the Wyoming is another Free State Project location. I imagine that the Wyoming group and New Hampshire group aren’t in cahoots with one another, so I am curious about just how many of these Free State Projects are out there, and how they all are fairing? Is New Hampshire the most effective one so far, or has one of the others been able to get more people to actually make the move to the selected state?
Thanks for doing the podcast on this issue. I’ve been wanting to hear more about it for ages, so to get to hear about it from someone who has actually taken part is a real treat.
I can tell you that the home schooling in NH is actually easy. I do not homeschool but I have friends that do and they were amazed at how easy it was. I have not heard anything about repealing that but I know one kid who was below grade level in reading and he was not made to go to public school.
I am LDS and have lived here all my life and I can tell you our #,s are growing. We have gone from one person 30 years ago to 3 stakes. It really just depends on where you go whether you will be the odd man out. Sometimes if you go to specific part of a town there are more members than others and the Bishops at each of the wards are more than happy to help people relocate to this area.