Homeschooling and a teen's say in their own education

Two Supreme Court cases set the frame. In Pierce v. Society of Sisters (1925), Oregon had passed a law requiring every child to attend public school. The Court struck it down, holding that the Constitution protects the liberty of parents and guardians to direct the upbringing and education of children under their control. The state can require that children be educated; it cannot require that the education happen in a public school.

In Wisconsin v. Yoder (1972), Amish families refused to send their children to school after eighth grade, and Wisconsin's compulsory attendance law said they had to. The Court held that applying the law to them violated the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment, the part that protects religious practice, because forcing the children into high school past eighth grade would gravely endanger the families' religious way of life.

Yoder also contains the one place the Supreme Court has spoken directly about a teenager's own voice in this decision. Justice Douglas, dissenting in part, wrote that the children themselves have constitutionally protectible interests and that a child should be given an opportunity to be heard before the state grants the exemption. That was a dissent, not the rule. Under current law, the choice belongs to the parents, and courts do not require that a minor agree.

Every state has a compulsory attendance law, which is the rule that children of certain ages must be in some form of schooling. Homeschooling is one way to satisfy it, and each state sets its own paperwork. New York's detailed rules are in Commissioner's Regulation 100.10.

In New York, parents send a notice of intent to the school district superintendent. The district must then respond with a copy of the home instruction regulations and an Individualized Home Instruction Plan, or IHIP, a form on which parents list the curriculum materials they will use in each required subject. The regulation also sets instructional hour requirements and an annual assessment.

Other states ask for far less: a one-time notice, or nothing at all.

Since the law does not give a minor a vote on the decision itself, the practical power is in shaping how it works. Two things are worth asking about. First, whether your state or district lets homeschooled students take individual classes, join sports, or use the library and labs at the public school; access rules differ by state and sometimes by district, so ask the district in writing. Second, whether a nearby community college offers dual enrollment to homeschooled students.

If the real problem is not homeschooling but not learning, that is a different situation. A parent who files the paperwork and then provides no instruction can fall under the state's truancy or educational neglect rules.