Researchers at the U.S. Department of Education, however, reported that growth in homeschooling basically come to a standstill from the spring of 2012 to the spring of 2016.[1] For some observers, this was simply an observation and reality but for others it seemed to defy other available information.
Ray (2018), for example, examined government-provided homeschool population data from 15 states, and from one large county in a sixteenth state.[2] Thirteen of these states provided data for the same years that the aforementioned federal researchers examined, the 2011-12 through 2015-16 school years. These states represented all four regions of the country, the Northeast, Midwest, South, and
West.
The mean change over the four years was a 26.0 percent increase in the homeschool population in absolute numbers, and the median change was a 20.1 percent increase. Ray pointed out that while the overall school-age population in the United States grew by about 2.0 percent from spring 2012 to spring 2016, data from 16 states
from all four major regions of the nation showed that homeschooling grew by an average of about 25 percent in those states. Therefore, if the data from these states are representative of what happened in the other states during those four years, then homeschooling continued to grow in both absolute numbers and as a portion of the overall school-age population.
Ray posited why his findings and conclusions might be different from those of the federal researchers. Soon after Ray, another research also addressed the same issue. Angela Watson (2018) published her piece entitled “Is homeschool cool? Current trends in American Homeschooling.”[3]
Methods
Watson used “… data from 22 state departments of education (DOEs) to examine official reports of homeschool participation instead of using more readily available survey estimates, and the numbers tell a different story” than what the federal researchers reported. This scholar laid out her purpose by saying that she
identified
... states as homeschool hot if they show an overall trend of growth in market share, and homeschool cool if there is an overall or recent decline in market share. The goal of this article is to contribute to the broader understanding of homeschooling and examine the current state of homeschooling in
America. I contribute to the literature by analyzing officially reported counts of homeschool participation at the state level for almost half of the states in America. (p. 401-402)
Findings
Researcher Watson carefully examined and presented data from the 22 states. She concluded the following, based on participation and market share (of the school-age population) from the 20 states for which she had the most complete data for the years 2000 to 2015 (excluding Massachusetts and
Vermont):
… there is a consistent trend of growth in homeschool participation. In these 20 states, homeschooling grew from almost 220,000 students and a market share of 1.87% in 2000, to almost 400,000 homeschool students and a market share of 2.64% in 2015 as seen in Figure 24. Clearly these 20 states are
homeschool hot with a 45% increase in participation since 2000, 11% since 2012. (p. 422)
Bluntly, “… data from state DOEs in 22 states calls national estimates [by the U.S. Department of Education] into question” (p. 423). Researcher Watson then offered some possible explanations for the differences between her findings and those of the federal researchers. “Only more data can offer answers. As usual, more
research is needed” (p. 423).
Summary
As Ray (2018) pointed out, the federal government-run study “… is just one study among many studies of the homeschool population and the findings of one study must be considered in the context of the entire research base and data from various sources.” Both Watson (2018) and Ray (2018) have provided solid findings and food
for thought that homeschooling, both in terms of market share and absolute numbers is still on the increase or, as Watson would call it, hot.
--Brian D. Ray, Ph.D.
National Home Education Research Institute
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Copyright © 2018 by Brian D. Ray
Endnotes:
[1]
McQuiggan, Meghan; Megra, Mahi; & Grady, Sarah. (2017, September). Parent and family involvement in education: Results from the National Household Education Surveys program of 2016: First look. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education. NCES 2017-102.
