Now that my oldest is officially graduated from the home education program, I sent off my evaluation letters for both of my children and my notarized affidavit and objectives for my remaining child for the 2023-2024 school year. You will see to the left what the notarization should contain at the bottom of your affidavit. As I explained previously, I opted to go ahead and pay for notarization instead of using the unsworn declaration that many homeschool parents are opting to use this year based on a change in the PA State Laws by the former governor. The Home School Legal Defense group has sent out a statement saying that it is acceptable to fulfill the home education law. I feel like I am better protected by following the home education law as it explicitly states, “the affidavit shall be satisfactory evidence thereof”.
To the right you will see what you MUST add to your unsworn declaration in order for it to be valid. For your consideration, when I went to the notary yesterday, she told me she’s been getting a lot of these affidavits, which means there are many in my district at least that are opting for notarization.
Before I begin, I need to say, I’m not a lawyer. I’m a mom who has been home educating her children since 2017. I’m a mom who has spent a lot of time researching, many things, but today is about the home education law and the PA school code. This needs to be said because many are providing bad advice or incorrect information. It’s your job to inform yourself. I want to help point you in the right direction so I’m going to share, piece by piece, everything I found, and then you get to make an informed decision. I will have some very strong opinions on this topic, remember, I am not a lawyer and not offering any legal advice. I know for a fact that school districts across the state of Pennsylvania have been using bully tactics to scare un-informed parents into submission to supply them with things they are not entitled to have. Up to now, my school district, generally, was not one of them. This year, it changed. I want you to inform yourself of all the law that will be used against you so that you can take a stand knowing you have all the information and knowledge forcing them to show you what they think you don’t know. Do not rely on the Home School Legal Defense organization to come to your aid. They likely will not. They have been disappointing many parents for several years, myself included. It’s not difficult to understand the law texts if you read them like this, it says what it means and means what it says. But, like reading the Bible, people attempt to make their own interpretations to suit their agenda. What’s difficult is finding the ones that matter to your issue. I’m talking all of them and looking at them in conjunction with each other when they cross-reference one another. I’ve done the work and I want to show you and provide you with information to help you be informed and un-afraid. I can’t say anything I will point out to you will help you in your argument. I’m going to face it this year myself. But I’m informed, and I have a plan and I’m not going to be bullied or made afraid. I will take it a step at time, as informed and calmly as possible. I don’t recommend communicating with your school district unless/until they have sent you a certified letter. The law affords you that right. I’ll get to that. That being said, I could not let this go any longer. I will quote the laws, provide links and provide my commentary on what they say. Then you will read the laws, in full context and form your own opinion to make an informed decision on how to proceed now or in the future. Remember this only pertains to Pennsylvania.
If you haven’t checked out this entire blog, I wanted to direct you to a few resources contained here. I have a link to free forms that you can, and should use for your homeschool record keeping. You can take a look and use them or get an idea of how to create your own. I have not only renamed this area but I have updated all the forms I created. There you can find a free transcript, affidavit, evaluation letters, reading materials log, an attendance record (not required), and a simple report card if you choose to use one (if I use one it’s sole purpose is for keeping a record in their academic record). I have also included forms from other places (of which many I can’t recall from where or I’d link the source) for your generic objectives that are required to be included with your affidavit and alternate affidavit, as well as the PDE diploma and immunization record (if you wish to use it). Your 12th grade evaluator needs to sign the PDE diploma. The Pennsylvania Department of Education has approved this diploma to be the “acceptable” parent-issued diploma. My suggestion is to print it, get it signed and in the event a college or some other entity requires a copy of their diploma you’ll have it. This does not mean you can’t make and issue your own and provide your graduate with that one for them to keep, but they should keep the PDE one as well.
Below are screenshots of some of the items mentioned. Visit the Free Forms page to download them.
Below is what the home education law states about the diploma:
(d.1) (1) Notwithstanding any provision of this act or any other law or regulation to the contrary, a high school diploma awarded by a supervisor or an approved diploma-granting organization shall be considered as having all the rights and privileges afforded by the Commonwealth, a Commonwealth agency, including, but not limited to, the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency, a political subdivision, a local agency and an authority or instrumentality of the Commonwealth or a political subdivision to a high school diploma awarded under this act, subject to subparagraphs (i) and (ii): (i) In the case of a diploma awarded by a supervisor the following shall apply: (A) The student receiving the diploma shall have completed all the requirements in subsection (d) while enrolled in a home education program that is in compliance with this section. (B) The diploma shall be awarded to the student on a standardized form to be developed by the department and which shall be made available on the department’s publicly accessible Internet website. (C) The diploma shall be signed by the student’s twelfth grade evaluator in confirmation of the student’s suitability for graduation. (ii) In the case of a diploma awarded by an approved diploma granting organization the following shall apply: (A) The student receiving the diploma shall have completed all the requirements in subsection (d) while enrolled in a home education program that is in compliance with this section. (B) The diploma shall be awarded to the student on a standardized form to be developed by the organization. (2) The department shall establish eligibility criteria and an application process for approving diploma-granting organizations to award high school diplomas to students enrolled in home education programs. The department shall maintain a list of approved diploma-granting organizations and post the list on the department’s publicly accessible Internet website.
You can do a search on topics such as curriculum, transcripts, reviews, portfolio, etc and find articles I’ve written since I began the blog in 2017. Please always make sure to follow the latest article for the most up to date information. There is a drop down list for you to select months/years of articles made as well as a tag block for you to click directly onto the topic of interest. Keep in mind that the blog may look different on different devices. You can always view the blog on your browser in desktop mode. I will be working on making the blog easier to navigate so keep an eye out for those changes. I plan to keep the blog current for as long as I have a child that I am homeschooling in the state of Pennsylvania. After that time remains to be seen. Rest assured though that I still have one remaining teenager with 2 more years highschool to go, so updates will continue, Lord willing. Everything I offer here is free to use, however as I am the content creator of the articles, I do retain the copyright to the articles I post. Please do share with others anything you find helpful but always supply the link to this blog. I receive no compensation for the information I have shared. My blog is only to help others navigate home education in the state of PA and perhaps my reviews can be helpful for anyone. Please do check out the other resources I have supplied for you in the Resources section of this blog.
It is soon to be March and soon enough spring should arrive. Springtime is full of, hopefully, more sun than we get in a Pennsylvania winter, new beginnings, as plants start coming back into bloom, and an indicator to me that we’re in the homestretch of our school year. This year it also means my soon-to-be 18 year old will graduate from homeschool and prepare for his future adventures, where ever that leads him. It usually means for me that I have paperwork to finalize; grades to complete, transcripts to update, and making an appointment with our evaluator to close out our year so I can send that paperwork and next year’s affidavit off to the school district. How different it will feel only putting one child’s name down and only shopping for education materials for one child, for the next 2 years, which will be the last 2 years of homeschool. Lord willing nothing prevents it.
Everything to this point has gone pretty well as far as the education materials are concerned. I have had no real issues with curriculum choices, my teens may say otherwise. They really did not enjoy Jensen’s Vocabulary for the 1st half of the year. The reason they didn’t like it is because they were bored, but pretty much any language arts curriculum they are bored. It’s not a reflection on the curriculum itself. I felt it to be valuable to them. They just didn’t agree. It wasn’t the most exciting thing to read/study. It was learning new words and there definitions and there roots. I even learned some new words. To me, it was beneficial. They are working on British literature in the 2nd half of the year and again, they are bored. Probably more my son than my daughter. They have read things like Utopia, Beowulf, Taming of the Shrew and others with plenty more to come. The Science course has given them some decent foundations. They studied math in science, moved on to physics, and completing biology currently and will finish up with chemistry. My 12th grader is not taking a history course this year having met his 3 required credits (and focusing instead on other things) and my 10th grader is using Lifepac, which she prefers this type of reading, comprehension, self evaluation and testing approach. The course is something she needs little help with and can do on her own which is what she likes. Next year she’s requesting all her subjects be Lifepacs, which is something I need to evaluate and make a decision about. Lifepac is solid instruction and it does take a motivated child to complete the work. I personally don’t like all the work contained as worksheets. Finally, for Bible we completed the our journey through the New Testament with curriculum from Christian Liberty press and moved on to a curriculum about Bible Truths: patterns for Christian Living, from Bob Jones Press. I have taken my own approach to the lessons that fit our needs and style. There is a teacher led lesson and a student led lesson with comprehension questions at the end of each and there are unit tests. When there is something I may not entirely agree with, I will explain to my teens this is the publisher’s viewpoint, and than share mine. They can then decide what theirs is.
The 2020-2021 school year is almost complete. We officially have just one day left to meet the required 180 days. We probably won’t be done until next week though. It’s been another interesting year. I would have liked things to go a bit different than they did, but we did the best we could, in the world in which we live. There were no field trips. They have been involved in church and youth group weekly. There have been other social events, but no trips other than one to a nearby arcade complete with mini bowling. Hey, that’s problem solving skills right there. Now that we are wrapping up its time to get prepared for evaluation. If you missed my post on that, you can see it here. Please do read it, especially if you are new to homeschooling in Pennsylvania. I see so many questions about this online. The law is clearly written. Follow what it says and you are good. Don’t add to it and don’t take away from it. Remember that you signed a legally binding document (the affidavit) before you began your homeschool program. That document isn’t just a formality in PA. It’s a legal document and if you are suspected and found guilty of not abiding by what you attested to in that document, you broke the law and there will be consequences. Not to harp on this topic, but as an example, as I said in that post, you are not required by law to show your evaluator any “proof” of completing your required “time”, as in, days or hours. You already attested to that in your legal document. No other form of “proof” is proof at all and is just a matter of trust, however, you signed a legal document stating you would provide education to your children for the required amount of time. If you don’t, you broke the law. I see nothing in the law that states an evaluator gets to determine if you did that by showing them any sort of paper with checked off boxes. Keep track of days/hours for your own records. Likewise, they don’t get to determine if you provided health services or if you in fact hold a highschool diploma. These are things you attest to in your legal document.
You must be logged in to post a comment.