Despite attempts by Harvard Law School to brand itself as an irreproachable authority on law and policy, recent scholarship from the institution on homeschooling leaves much to be desired.

In an editorial published this year by Harvard Magazine headlined “The Risks of Homeschooling,” Erin O’Donnell issued a scathing indictment of K-12 home education, which has reignited a decades-old controversy about the practice. Her piece relies upon a recent article published in the Arizona State Law Review titled “Homeschooling: Parent Rights Absolutism vs. Child Rights to Education and Protection” by Elizabeth Bartholet, a professor at Harvard Law School. Bartholet advocates a legal presumption against homeschooling subject to limited exceptions.