Homeschooling in New Jersey
New Jersey sets no filing, approval, or testing for homeschoolers. Apart from one high school form, the law asks only that your teaching keep pace with the local public school.
What you must do
New Jersey requires education from age 6 to 16, and a child may be taught at home for all of those years.
The compulsory education law, N.J.S.A. 18A:38-25, lets a child receive equivalent instruction elsewhere than at school. In State v. Massa (1967), a New Jersey court measured that equivalence by academics alone, not by social development. The local board of education is not required or authorized to review or approve your curriculum or to monitor the results.
Provide academically equivalent instruction
Every school year
Teach at the level the local public school offers children of similar grade and attainment. You choose the program and the teacher, and you are responsible for the results.
Complete the high school transfer form
When withdrawing from high school
If you remove a student enrolled in high school, complete the school's transfer form, which records your intent to provide instruction elsewhere than at school for the state's enrollment data.
Send documentation, such as a letter of intent
Only if the district asks
A district with credible evidence that your child is not being educated may ask for documentation, such as a letter of intent. One signed letter answers the request; it is not an annual filing.
What you do not have to do
- A routine notice or registration
- Approval of your curriculum or program
- Standardized tests
- A teaching certificate
- Records kept or turned in
- Annual renewal
Taking your child out of school
Outside high school, New Jersey sets no withdrawal notice. The New Jersey Department of Education (NJDOE) encourages parents to tell the local board of education of the intent to educate the child elsewhere than at school, so that questions about compliance do not arise. Withdrawing your child to homeschool is not, by itself, credible evidence of a violation.
What the letter says
- Your child's full name, grade, and school
- That you are homeschooling under N.J.S.A. 18A:38-25
- The date homeschooling begins
- Your signature and the date
A second situation also calls for a statement. If a district refuses to enroll your child and you do not file an intent to appeal, you must tell it whether your child will attend another district, a nonpublic school, or receive instruction elsewhere than at school.
Before you go, ask the school for copies of report cards, test scores, and any special education evaluations.
Records worth keeping
New Jersey requires no homeschool records. The board of education is not required to open a record for a child taught at home; if you send it information, it may keep a record only to document that your child is receiving an education.
Records still help when someone asks what your child has learned:
- A district request based on credible evidence, when a description of your program and samples of work show equivalent instruction
- Re-enrolling in a public school
- Applying to college or a county vocational school, which reads a transcript
You may ask the local board for its curriculum. A district's curriculum is a public record, so the board must provide it, and you may be charged the legal copying rate.
Testing
A child educated elsewhere than at school is not required to take a state or district standardized test. NJDOE says the local board is neither required nor authorized to test your child, so a district request for testing is not a legal requirement. Any test you arrange, for your own planning or a later application, is your choice.
Tests come up only on a return or a credential:
- Returning to public school, covered below.
- State diploma: passing the General Educational Development (GED) test earns a New Jersey State High School Diploma.
Special education and public-school services
Every school district must find and evaluate children with disabilities who live in it, homeschooled children included (34 CFR 300.111). When the district receives your written request for a special education evaluation, the child study team, you, and a regular education teacher meet to decide whether an evaluation is warranted and which assessments to use, and you receive written notice of those decisions. After the assessments, a meeting decides eligibility.
If your child is eligible, the district must make a free appropriate public education available only if your child enrolls. If your child stays home and the district chooses to provide services, it writes a plan for them.
Classes, activities, and textbooks
A local board may, but need not, let a homeschooled child join classes and activities, and it may, but need not, lend books or materials.
A child who lives in the county may apply each year to the county vocational school, which may admit the child to a shared-time program if space allows. Who pays for it is explained below.
High school, diplomas, and transcripts
New Jersey's graduation requirements apply to public schools. A homeschooled child does not receive a state-endorsed high school diploma from the board of education. You decide what your child studies and when high school is complete, and you can issue your own diploma and transcript.
A child who wants a state credential can pass the GED test for the New Jersey State High School Diploma, or re-enroll in public school, where the district assesses whether the child meets state and local requirements for its diploma. A diploma cannot be issued when those requirements are not met.
College admission and college classes
New Jersey's homeschool rules set no college admission standard for homeschool graduates, and the state has no dual enrollment program open to homeschoolers. Each college, public or private, decides whether and how it admits a homeschool graduate or a high school age student, including what it accepts as proof of high school completion.
The school records you can give a college are the transcript and diploma you issue, plus any test scores your child earns. A college sees your homeschool coursework only if you send it.
Sports and activities
The local board of education is not required to let a homeschooled child play school sports; it may allow curricular, extracurricular, and sports participation at its sole discretion. NJDOE suggests a board get its attorney's advice before deciding.
New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) bylaws require an athlete to be enrolled in the member school, with one exception: home-schooled students may be eligible if the local board has approved their participation and the requirements of NJSIAA's Homeschool Guidelines are met. Without board approval, NJSIAA rules give a homeschooled child no route onto that school's team.
Paying for homeschooling
New Jersey has no homeschool tax credit, deduction, education savings account, or voucher. The family pays for the homeschool program.
The one cost the state system covers is county vocational school. Once admitted, the student becomes a public school student for that program and is entitled to tuition paid through the resident district and to transportation under N.J.S.A. 18A:39-1 and the board's rules.
Going back to public school
When your child returns to school, the local board treats the child like any other new or returning student, assessing which credits to accept and the right grade level. No special rules apply to a homeschooled child.
Placement should be based on an objective assessment given to all students for that subject or grade, and your child may not be held to a higher standard than similar students already in the district or transferring from other public or nonpublic schools. A placement decision may include scores on the state assessments for the proposed grade.
If the school district contacts you
The local board enforces the compulsory education law. If the board still believes the law is being broken after it asks for documentation, it may ask its attorney about bringing charges.
In court, the State must first allege a violation; you then present evidence that you provide equivalent instruction, and the State carries the burden of proving the instruction is not equivalent (State v. Vaughn, 1965). A parent found in violation is a disorderly person, with a fine of up to $25 for the first offense and up to $100 for each later offense.
FAQ
- Can someone other than a parent do the teaching?
Yes. A tutor, correspondence course, or web-based program can provide the instruction. The parent is solely responsible for the program chosen, and no one teaching at home needs New Jersey teacher certification.
- We already homeschool and are moving to New Jersey. What do we file?
Nothing. A family arriving from another state has no filing to make. The transfer form applies only to a student leaving a New Jersey high school, and the voluntary notice described under withdrawing works the same for you.
The teaching and the paperwork, handled
School in a Box, our full-curriculum plan, teaches every core subject and electives starting at your child's level and grades each reading check and project as soon as it is submitted. Attendance comes from each day's check-in, and we draft the withdrawal letter, attendance log, transcript, and diploma from that record, ready to sign.
$149/month per child after the trial.