Homeschooling Step 1: Know Your Legal Rights & Obligations

Home School Legal Defense Association is the country’s advocacy association for homeschoolers since 1983, and is a must-have resource for all homeschoolers in America. Whenever an interested or new homeschool family inquires what their first step is, I always say go to their site

1. Find your state here,
2. Go to the upper-right-box which shows the State’s Resources, for example “Indiana Resources”,
3. The first link with say “LAWS: How to legally homeschool in (your state).”
4. Click the first link which will be a PDF “A Legal Analysis”.
5. Advice: Opt for minimum reporting, which is the least you have to do legally. In other words, I’ve never done anything “optional”.

I prefer this method and shared this with dozens (or 100s) of families, because you can keep a PDF handy. It’s armed with the state statutes ready for any school district who tries to sway you incorrectly and to their advantage.

While you’re there, become a HSLDA facebook fan too, I’ve found this resource has been a good replacement (at least for me) for their email list for alerts and news. They’re new to twitter, but it doesn’t hurt to follow them too.

 

 

Tags: featured, homeschool law

Category: Homeschooling 101