Home schooling has experienced massive growth in the United States for more than a decade.

Home-Schooling Movement Surges 62% in a Single Decade


by PETER JESSERER SMITH


Recent studies show the face of home schooling is changing, as online tools and better curricula make it easier for parents seeking a top-notch education for their children to make the leap.

When Christina Banks, a Catholic mother of four, decided with her husband to educate her children at home instead of at the area’s Catholic school, they cited a variety of reasons.

“The first one would be to have them get an individualized education that meets the needs of each student; the second was that we were drawn to a classical curriculum; and the third would be flexibility in time with family,” said Banks, a resident of Fredericksburg, Va., who added that her elementary-age children went back and forth between home education and Catholic school over the past few years before they settled on home education.

Home schooling has experienced massive growth in the United States for more than a decade. The face of the home-education movement has also changed. Fewer parents now attribute the need to give religious instruction as the driving motivation behind their choice, with more parents such as Banks citing home schooling’s educational benefits as the reason they are turning to the nontraditional method.

According to the most recent data available from the Department of Education, the home-school movement has entered into a new era, with a more mainstream face.

Explosive Growth

The Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) shows the number of children educated at home between kindergarten and 12th grade increased close to 62% between 2003 and 2012. The number of home-schooled students between the ages of 5 and 17 in the U.S. rose from 1.09 million in 2003 to 1.77 million by 2012, accounting for 3.4% of the school-age population.

“It has become demystified, and it’s become more acceptable, socially and culturally, for people to home school,” said Mike Donnelly, a home-schooling father and staff attorney at the Home School Legal Defense Association, where he serves as director of international affairs.


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