Chapter 2: The Legal Status of Home Schooling: An Overview

The emergence of compulsory attendance laws in the mid-Nineteenth Century led to dramatic changes in the American educational system. Previously, many children in the earliest days of the American Republic were educated in private schools or in Europe. Still other American children were educated at home due to the absence of local free public schools; the practices in early America are legally distinguishable from today’s home school movement where public, and non-public, education is available, but parents choose, the arguments of some proponents notwithstanding, to instruct their young at home.

Even so, this chapter does not engage in a discussion of such issues as the intent and/ or goals of parents who educate their young in their homes, speculate on how many children are educated at home, or address educational outcomes of students who are home schooled. Rather, this chapter provides a legal overview of the status of home schooling in the United States while examining key issues subject to litigation.