Homeschooling in Minnesota

Minnesota has no separate withdrawal form; the initial report is what tells the district your child is now in a home school. Send it before or on your child's last day, so the district does not count the days at home as absences. A move works the same way: report within 15 days of leaving your old district and by October 1 in the new one.

The superintendent may offer an online form, but cannot require you to use it; a mailed or hand-delivered report counts. Keep a dated copy.

Who qualifies to teach

Each instructor must meet one of five tests: a Minnesota teaching license for the subject and grade, direct supervision by a licensed teacher, teaching in an accredited school, a bachelor's degree, or being the parent of a child who takes the annual test. The report includes the evidence for whichever applies.

A child under 7 who is enrolled in public kindergarten or a higher grade may be subject to the attendance law if the district has not exempted that age. You may withdraw such a child for good cause, which includes enrolling the child in another school, a home school among them.

Minnesota keeps your teaching and testing records at home. No one reviews them routinely; the law makes them available to the county attorney only when a truancy or child protection case is started or diverted.

The records do more work when your child goes back to public school, because the enrolling school asks for the test scores and other education documents to place your child. A short yearly set covers that: the subjects and main materials, a few work samples, each test score, and from ninth grade on, each course with its grade and credit for the transcript you write.

You and the superintendent agree on the specific test, how it is given, and where. If the test does not cover every required subject, a parent teaching without a license or licensed supervision also assesses the child in the subjects it skips. Accreditation of a homeschool is optional; its main effect is waiving the yearly test.

When scores are low

A total battery score at or below the 30th percentile, or one grade level below children the same age, means you must get an additional evaluation of your child's abilities to find out whether there is a learning problem. The law does not order your child into school because of a low score; it orders the further evaluation.

Your resident district must loan standardized tests, along with textbooks and other instructional materials, when you make a formal request for them, because Minnesota counts a home school as a nonpublic school. A district that gives its own students curriculum with an electronic part must also give your child access to it on request, if the cost to the district is only incidental.

Federal law requires every school district to locate and evaluate children with disabilities who live in it, homeschooled children included. This duty is called Child Find. To start, ask your resident district in writing for an evaluation.

A district cannot deny an eligible resident special instruction and services on a shared time basis because the child attends a nonpublic school, and a home school is one. Shared time means the child attends the public school for part of the day. The district decides, child by child, whether services are given at a public school, a neutral site, or the home school, and when the services are at a public school building in the district, it provides transportation to them.

Shared time also covers regular classes. A district that enrolls a homeschooler part time receives state aid for the student, but the law leaves the decision to admit your child to each district's own policy.

Minnesota's graduation standards are written for public schools and do not bind a home school. The parent decides the high school course of study and issues the diploma and transcript, and neither the Minnesota Department of Education nor any district certifies or validates a homeschool diploma or transcript.

College credit earned through Postsecondary Enrollment Options counts toward a public school diploma if your child later enrolls: a district must grant secondary credit for a course completed for secondary credit, and seven quarter or four semester college credits equal at least one full year of high school credit.

A homeschooler may also enroll full time in public high school to finish there. The district then decides which earlier work counts toward its own graduation requirements, using the documents it asks for at enrollment.

Minnesota law sets no special admission rule for homeschool graduates; each college decides what it asks for, usually a transcript and test scores.

Homeschooled students can take free college courses through Postsecondary Enrollment Options (PSEO). Juniors and seniors may take nonsectarian college courses, and 10th graders may take career and technical courses at a Minnesota state college or university. A homeschooler must register with the commissioner of education before taking part, then apply to the college and meet its admission standards. For a course taken for high school credit, the state pays the college, which may not charge for fees, textbooks, or materials; a course taken only for college credit may carry those costs.

Homeschool dual enrollment in Minnesota

Minnesota law requires every school board to let resident homeschoolers fully participate in extracurricular activities on the same basis as public school students. That covers sports and other activities that earn no school credit and run mostly outside school hours.

That equal footing cuts both ways: Minnesota State High School League (MSHSL) eligibility and conduct standards, the school's registration process, physical exams, and activity fees all apply to a homeschooler. Contact the school's activities office before the season, because physicals and eligibility paperwork must be done before the first practice.

Homeschool sports eligibility in Minnesota

Minnesota offers two tax breaks that cover home school costs. The K-12 Education Subtraction lowers taxable income by the education expenses you pay, up to $1,625 for each child in kindergarten through grade 6 and $2,500 for each child in grades 7 through 12. The refundable K-12 Education Credit pays 75 percent of those expenses, up to $1,500 per child for families with adjusted gross income of $70,000 or less, shrinking as income rises; that income figure is adjusted each year.

Qualifying expenses include textbooks and instructional materials for subjects commonly taught in Minnesota public schools, up to $200 per family for a computer and educational software, and tutoring or classes from a qualified instructor who is not the child's parent, grandparent, or sibling. Religious materials do not count, and an expense used for the credit cannot also be subtracted.

Homeschool tax breaks and funding in Minnesota

When your child enrolls full time in public school, you give the school the scores from the annual tests and any other education documents it requires. The school uses them to decide your child's grade placement and which course requirements apply. This does not apply to a shared time student who is not seeking a public school diploma.

Minnesota sets no statewide placement test for returning homeschoolers. Placement and the credit given for high school work at home are decided under each district's own policy.

Minnesota spells out what happens before any prosecution. If the superintendent believes your child is being taught in violation of the law, you get a written notice listing the specific violations. You then have 15 days to correct them.

• Not corrected in 15 days: the superintendent asks the commissioner of education for fact-finding and mediation.
• Not resolved through mediation: the superintendent notifies you by certified mail and then the county attorney.
• The county attorney may file a criminal complaint, which proceeds as a misdemeanor case.

Each step gives you a chance to fix the problem, for example by filing a missing report or immunization statement, before the next one starts.

Educational neglect is a separate question. County social services, not the Department of Education, has jurisdiction over it, and reports go to the county where the child lives.