Brian D. Ray, Ph.D.
National Home Education Research Institute (NHERI)
Brian D. Ray presented this paper for the first time at the International School Choice and Reform Conference ISCRC held during January 16-20, 2025 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Abstract
This article articulates the need for a clear and consistent definition of homeschooling as parent-controlled home-based privately funded private education (PCHBPE) to aid in research and in communication by the public at large. It explores scholarly, historical, philosophical, and general public definitions of homeschooling, primarily focusing on the United States context from 1985 onward. It addresses changes in homeschooling during the modern home education movement while finding that homeschooling consistently involves parents controlling their children’s education primarily from home. There is a focus on the ongoing debate over parental versus state authority and control in education and recent ambiguities and terms regarding homeschooling introduced by certain government programs and scholars. The implications of tax funding (e.g., tax-funded school choice education savings accounts (ESAs), vouchers, and refundable tax credits) and civil government regulatory definitions further complicate the landscape of homeschooling. Thus, the clear and consistent definition is needed and offered.
Keywords: Homeschooling, Definition, Research Methods, History, Philosophy, School Choice, Education Savings Accounts, Vouchers
The general public has had a firm sense of what it means to homeschool from about 1985 to present in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom.[1] The first 35 years of this period was the beginning of the modern homeschool movement – a renascence of an age-old practice (Carper, 1992; Gordon & Gordon, 1990; Meyer, 1983) – and those who have been engaging in it with their families and those writing about it have known what it is. Scholars have been more careful about the definition. They have generally accepted that homeschooling is the practice of parents[2] in charge of planning and administering their children’s privately-run education and most of it occurring at home in the context of family life, while the children do not go away to a place or organization called school.
Things change in academia, policymaking, and popular culture, however, so this paper addresses what it means to homeschool today. The purpose of this article is to define homeschooling from historical, scholarly, and philosophical perspectives in order to help academics do their work well and to help others in society be consistent in communication. In addition, this effort will focus on home-based education in the United States.
Historical and Descriptive Perspective
From a macro-perspective, such large percentages of what we now call school-age children were home educated and not sent away from home to be institutionally schooled before 1885 that it is likely no one needed a term like homeschooling (Gordon & Gordon, 1990; McShane, 2021, p. 14; (United States Department of Education 2009, Table 33). There were, however, terms such as “domestic education” to refer to academic and other education that was commonly provided at home by parents, older siblings, and tutors when institutional schools were present (Gordon & Gordon).
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Scholarly, Academic, and Intellectual Perspectives on the Meaning of Homeschooling
There have been mainly two phases in the academic world over the past 40 years regarding the basic definition of homeschooling. The first firmly endured from about 1975 to 2020, and the second, less distinct phase, has appeared over the past five years.
Takin’ It Easy: Everyone Knows What It Is. The general public and scholars clearly knew the basic definition of homeschooling for the first three decades of the modern homeschooling movement.
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Hints of Confusion Appear About Nine Years Ago. A few scholars during the past five years have introduced or discussed some uncertainty regarding what it means to homeschool in the United States.
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Defining homeschooling as parent-controlled home-based privately funded private education (PCHBPE) allows research to ascertain the effects or differences of an educational approach that is rich with the features noted in the preceding paragraph and can rarely be had in any kind of institutionally operated schooling or free of state controls, free of state licensure, free of necessary involvement by state-endorsed expertise, and free of state tax money.
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On August 3, 2025, SSRN announced:
Congratulations! Your paper is a Recent Top Paper! Your paper, “DEFINING HOMESCHOOLING AND WHY IT MATTERS”, was listed on SSRN’s Top Downloads list today for: ERN: Education Policy (Sub-Topic) and Educational Administration & Leadership eJournal.
Now, you may read the entire paper here:
References
Ray, Brian D. (2025). Defining Homeschooling and Why It Matters, https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5211580
[1] In the United Kingdom, however, most or many people called it home education.
[2] In terms of philosophical and legal relationship in this education, parents in this paper will refer to either parents or guardians.