Thinking About Homeschooling in Kentucky?
Where do you start? Is it temporary or long-term? If you have had your kids in Public School and you wish to homeschool for this year only, you have two options. Public Schools will likely have at home options this year for students with health issues or who live with families with health issues. This will look like NTI, like over the COVID-19 lockdown. The other option is to withdraw your student(s), make sure to get their transcript, and send a Letter of Intent. You will legally have a private school and be solely responsible for your child’s education.
What is a Letter of Intent?
A letter of intent is the mechanism by which you are informing the public school that you are enrolling your child into private school. The Kentucky Department of Education and the legislature have agreed with homeschoolers in the Best Practices Document that if they send in a letter that contains the following information, they will be homeschooling legally. The letter needs to contain:
- The name of the school (i.e., a name for your homeschool)
- The address of the school (i.e., your home address)
- the names and ages of each student
- the signature of the parent(s)/guardian(s)
It must be sent within 2 weeks of the first day of school in the district in which you live. That means two weeks before or after the date. We recommend that it the letter is sent via certified mail so that you have record of it being sent. CHEK offers a sample Letter of Intent. For a list of our Counties, Superintendents and School Start Dates, check out our Forms & Downloads page.
I am Homeschooling. Now what?
You are required to keep records in Kentucky. They are an attendance record and report cards. You must homeschool for 170 days for 6.25 hours per day. If that sounds scary, fear not: most things done around the house can count for school, like cooking meals, doing chores, taking care of pets or exercising. Also, trips to the doctor/dentist, grocery store, library, or other more fun field trips can also count as school!
Report Cards / Transcripts (High School) must be kept at the same rate as the district you live in. For example, if they do quarterly reports, so should you. You do not need an accredited curriculum in Kentucky, either to graduate a student or to put them back into public school.
If homeschooling sounds right for you, LIGHT may be a good fit!