David Barfield
CHECK Chairman
Lawrence, KS

David and Cathy Barfield were married in 1979 in Minnesota after meeting three years earlier in Florida on a summer project with Campus Crusade for Christ. They spent four years on staff with Campus Crusade for Christ, three of them as vocational missionaries in Southern Africa, where their first daughter was born. In 1984, David, Cathy, and their 4-month-old daughter moved to Lawrence, Kansas, where they continue to live.

Currently, the Barfields have three daughters, ages 20, 18 and 14, whom they have home-schooled from the beginning. This school year, the older two are attending the University of Kansas while living at home and the youngest is in 9th grade.

David works for the Division of Water Resources in Topeka, where he has worked since his return to Lawrence. Currently, David's primary duties at DWR relate to interstate river agreements and disputes. He spends much of his time doing technical work to support Kansas' litigation against Colorado concerning the waters of the Arkansas River and implementing a recent settlement of a lawsuit with Nebraska and Colorado concerning the waters of the Republican River.

The Barfields have always followed an eclectic approach in selecting curriculum. In their early years of homeschooling, the focus was on instilling a love of reading and learning using Sing, Spell, Read, Write, units from KONOS, and math. In the elementary years, they added subjects from a variety of vendors. In junior high, they did two years with Sonlight as the core of their curriculum. During the high school years they used Konos for high school students and help organize classes for homeschool students in the Lawrence in the sciences, writing, speech, and Spanish.

As David and Cathy began homeschooling in 1989, TEACH, Lawrence's homeschool group, was beginning a significant transition from a small group meeting monthly for units and field trips to a larger organization with more groups and activities. At the beginning of the 1990 school year, David attended an organizational meeting with Cathy, asked a few questions, and David and Cathy were given leadership responsibility for the group, which they have held since.

Also in 1990, David attended, on behalf of TEACH, the organizational meetings which ultimately lead to the formation of CHECK. David was elected its first treasurer in 1991. Since 1995, David has been CHECK's chairman.

Cathy is a biology teacher by training. She and other homeschooling moms have taught biology and chemistry since 1997 (David taught physics one year as well).

Two years ago the Barfields moved to a home in rural Douglas County.

The Barfields attend Community Bible Church in Lawrence, where David has been an elder since 1986.