<p>I was looking at Fordham's admission requirements for home schooled students and on their FAQs this is what it said.</p>
<p>Meeting State Requirements
In order to be admitted, we do need to determine that the student has conformed to his or her states requirements regarding home schooling. This is a provision of both federal and state policy regarding the disbursement of financial aid.</p>
<p>What does this mean exactly? Is this something I would have to do if I applied?Is this standard practice at all schools or just Fordham, I don't recall coming across anything like this on any other school websites.</p>
<p>This is from Finaid.org and, I think, answers the question you’re asking:</p>
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<p>So, Fordham may have spelled it out where other colleges have not, but it’s a general rule. It’s a good thing, actually, because the federal gov’t is acknowledging that a student can legitimately complete a homeschool education and not be treated like a drop-out and be forced to take the GED or an ability-to-benefit test (these are like placement tests for community colleges that show merely a basic competency… not something a well-educated homeschool student should be forced to take.)</p>
<p>That makes sense.But then how do they go about ensuring that a home schooled student has conformed to the student’s home state requirement regarding home schooling?I’m from Illinois and you are not required to register here. Fordham makes it seem as if there is something that they need to verify such as I need to turn in a form or they check with the state itself.</p>
<p>It says something about required classes: “Language arts, biological and physical science, math, history and social sciences (which shall include a course in the U.S. and Illinois Constitution), fine arts, health and physical development.” As long as you have done all those, I think you could write up a letter saying “Here are the Illinois laws: blah blah blah, Here are how my homeschool program met those laws: blah blah blah.” It’s hard for colleges to distinguish between dropouts and homeschoolers, but homeschooling is legal and the federal government protects it (I don’t know the statutes). Call the admissions office and see how much proof they want.</p>
<p>I doubt if Fordham is going to check with the states - they can’t, if the state is Illinois! To my knowledge, there is no such official form. I put a line on my son’s transcript that said something like “This homeschool program meets with the current Colorado Homeschool laws”. I didn’t include a statute. </p>
<p>You are not required to register, so please don’t. It is important to future homeschoolers that you don’t give the government more than they ask for, or then they will feel justified in asking for it.</p>
<p>hawaiiansuagr3, I’m not sure you need to do anything at all. When you fill out the FAFSA you’ll have 3 options to explain your graduation status: 1)diploma, 2)GED, and 3)homeschool. Check #3. That should be all you need to do. In the event you need more, you can write a short statement saying you have graduated from a secondary school homeschool in compliance with all Illinois homeschooling state requirements. Then sign it and have it notarized. You can send it to the admission office of the college if requested. (No need to if it’s not requested.)</p>
<p>My son’s best friend did this for Northwestern, but I don’t think it was actually necessary.</p>
<p>The school spells out that policy to be in compliance with federal financial aid laws. The idea is that only students who are prepared to benefit from higher education will be eligible for federal aid. Basically it’s a nod to screening out people who are just trying to hop on board the financial aid gravy train who aren’t serious college students. If you can get accepted to a college like Fordham (or even Podunk Community College), then it’s a moot point. But the colleges need to be in compliance with those federal regs in order to maintain their own legitimacy with regards to the federal gov’t.</p>
<p>It’s a little confusing in the way Fordham puts it because they first link it to admissions, and then to financial aid. It’s really a financial aid issue, because Fordham can set its own admissions policies. If I was you, I’d just submit my application. Perhaps on your transcript, somewhere near the bottom, just add a note: Homeschool education in complete compliance with all Illinois state laws and regulations.</p>
<p>Anyway, I don’t think this is an issue. I wouldn’t worry about it.</p>
<p>Aha, Illinois! I can speak to that, having had two homeschoolers go on to college.
Homeschool students here are treated as private school students, which schools are unregulated educationally by the state, or by local school districts either. There are no requirements for testing, nor is there a responsibility to notify the state or your local district that you are home schooling. It is impossible to know how many kids are homeschooled in Illinois.
I’m not sure what Fordham is looking for. The requirement in the law here is that you have been schooled in 5 or 6 general areas (I forget which), to which your parents could attest. In my kids’ cases, the colleges were uninterested in any such thing.</p>
<p>Our state doesn’t have many guidelines for its homeschooling program. But anticipating questions about our “program” from admissions people, I created a school profile which contained an explanation and table of our guidelines for graduation from our home school program. These guidelines were similar to our state’s and included XX credits of science, English, social studies, etc. In the table, right next to those requirements, I made a column of how many credits my home school student had actually earned in our program. They met or exceeded the expected (state) guidelines in every case. To me, it seemed important to present a document to the colleges showing them what we expected out of our homeschool progam, and how that compared to the traditional high school route. We didn’t have any questions from colleges and as others have mentioned, for the FAFSA we checked the box stating that we met state guidelines for homeschooling in general.</p>