More than 2,000 homeschooling parents and kids clashed with state lawmakers during a heated hearing on Monday afternoon.

Lawmakers are considering more oversight after a Waterbury man was allegedly held captive by his own family for 20 years.

The victim's family claimed he was being homeschooled.

The case has renewed attention on Connecticut’s homeschooling regulations – or lack thereof.

Connecticut is one of a dozen states with “no meaningful regulation of homeschooling,” including filing a curriculum plan with education officials, according to a new report from the Connecticut Office of Child Advocate.

“Currently, a parent can sign a withdrawal form. They can check off, ‘I'm going to private school,’ or ‘I’m going to homeschool,” said acting child advocate Christina Ghio. “And currently, what happens then is, nothing.”

The report notes other cases where parents hid abuse under the guise of homeschooling their children.

Now, Democratic lawmakers are considering more oversight.

The General Assembly’s Education and Children’s committees held an informational forum on Monday afternoon, hearing from education and child welfare officials, as well as a homeschooling advocate.

“People who are abusing children can exit their child from public school and hide that abuse, and that's obviously not what we want,” said state Rep. Jennifer Leeper (D-Fairfield). “It’s definitely not an attempt to scapegoat the homeschooling community for what happened in Waterbury.”

Parents were not allowed to speak at the forum, but thousands came armed with protest signs. Police removed one protester.

“We don't want any child to fall through the cracks; we don’t want there to be any horrific case of abuse like that,” said Justin Bennett, a homeschooling parent from Lisbon. “But at the same time, we don't want one outlier case that again is not a homeschooling problem – a homeschooling failure – to become the scapegoat.”

Bennett’s brought his 9-year-old son, Jonathan, who prefers learning at home.

“I can study at my own pace and I can study subjects that I’m interested in,” he said.

Homeschooling families insisted that they aren’t the problem.

Instead, they blame at the Connecticut Department of Children and Families, which reportedly received more than a dozen reports from the Waterbury victim’s elementary school principal as far back as 2004.

“If they were not inundated with frivolous cases, they would be able to handle the other cases so much better,” said Sarah, who teaches her seven children at home in Waterford.

DCF Commissioner Jody Hill-Lilly testified publicly for the first time on Monday. While she couldn’t address the Waterbury case specifically, Hill-Lilly told lawmakers that removing a child is not so cut-and-dry.

“We have to prove imminency that a child is at risk of imminent harm in order to remove a child or intervene,” she said.

Republicans slammed Democrats for focusing on parents instead of DCF.

“Shame on you” said Connecticut Senate Minority Leader Stephen Harding (R-Brookfield). “If you care about these children, get criminals off the street that abuse children and actually regulate the systematic problem we have in our state government.”

As of now, there is no actual homeschooling legislation under consideration.

Because the legislative session ends in one month, any bill would bypass the normal public hearing process.