ED435709 1999-09-00 The Scholastic

Achievement of Home School Students.

ERIC/AE Digest.

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The Scholastic Achievement of Home School Students. ERIC/AE

Digest...........................................................................1

MAJOR FINDINGS - DEMOGRAPHICS....................................2

MAJOR FINDINGS - ACHIEVEMENT...................................... 2

LIMITATIONS....................................................................3

DISCUSSION.................................................................... 3

REFERENCES.................................................................. 5

ERIC Identifier: ED435709

Publication Date: 1999-09-00

Author: Rudner, Lawrence M.

Source: ERIC Clearinghouse on Assessment and Evaluation Washington DC.

The Scholastic Achievement of Home School

Students. ERIC/AE Digest.

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Summarizing demographic characteristics and achievement results for 20,760 home

ED435709 1999-09-00 The Scholastic Achievement of Home School Students. ERIC/AE

Digest.

Page 1 of 6
school students, the largest study of home schooling conducted to date (Rudner,1999a)

was released in Spring 1999 with a great deal of press coverage. This Digest highlights

some of the findings, identifies limitations of the study, and presents several

conclusions.

In Spring 1998, 39,607 home school students contracted to take the Iowa Tests of Basic

Skills (ITBS; grades K-8) or the Tests of Achievement and Proficiency (TAP; grades

9-12) through Bob Jones University Press Testing and Evaluation Service. Students

were given an achievement test and their parents were asked to complete a

questionnaire entitled "Voluntary Home School Demographic Survey."A total of 20,760

students in 11,930 families provided useable questionnaires with corresponding

achievement tests. The achievement test and questionnaire results were combined to

form the dataset used in the study.

MAJOR FINDINGS - DEMOGRAPHICS

Home school parents in the study had more formal education than parents in the

general population; 88% continued their education beyond high school compared to

50% for the nation as a whole.

Many home school parents were formally trained as teachers. Almost one-fourth of

home school students (24%) have at least one parent who is a certified teacher.

The median income for home school families ($52,000) was significantly higher than

that of all families with children ($36,000) in the United States.

Almost all home school students (98%) were in married couple families. Most home

school mothers (77%)did not participate in the labor force; almost all home school

fathers (98%) did work.

Home school students watched much less television than students nationwide; 65% of

home school students watch one hour or less per day compared to 25% nationally.

The distribution of home school students by grade in grades 1-6 was consistent with

that of all school children. Proportionally fewer home school students were enrolled at

the high school level.

MAJOR FINDINGS - ACHIEVEMENT

Almost 25% of home school students were enrolled one or more grades above their

age-level peers in public and private schools.

Home school student achievement test scores were exceptionally high. The median

scores for every subtest at every grade (typically in the 70th to 80th percentile) were

well above those of public and Catholic/Private school students.

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Page 2 of 6 ED435709 1999-09-00 The Scholastic Achievement of Home School Students. ERIC/AE

Digest.
On average, home school students in grades 1 to 4 performed one grade level above

their age-level public/private school peers on achievement tests.

Students who had been home schooled their entire academic life had higher scholastic

achievement test scores than students who had also attended other educational

programs.

There were no meaningful differences in achievement by gender, whether the student

was enrolled in a full-service curriculum, or whether a parent held a state issued

teaching certificate.

There were significant achievement differences among home school students when

classified by amount of money spent on education, family income, parent education,

and television viewing.

LIMITATIONS

In spite of the large size of the student sample, there are notable limitations to the study.

Foremost, home school students and their families are not a cross-section of the United

States population. The act of home schooling distinguishes this group in terms of their

exceptionally strong commitment to education and children. As highlighted above, there

were major demographic differences between home school families in this study and

the general United States population.

This was not a controlled experiment. Students were not randomly assigned public,

private or home schools. As a result, the reported achievement differences between

groups do not control for background differences in the home school and general United

States population and, more importantly, cannot be attributed to the type of school a

child attends. Thus, the study was not designed to compare home schools with public or

private schools. Such comparisons would be fraught with problems. Home schooling is

typically one-on-one. Public schools typically have classes with 25 to 30 students and

an extremely wide range of abilities and backgrounds. Home school parents are, by

definition, heavily involved in their children's education; the same, unfortunately, is not

true of all public or private school parents. Home schools can easily pace and adapt

their curriculum; public and private schools typically have a mandated scope and

sequence. The list of differences could continue.

It should be noted that it was not possible within the parameters of this study to evaluate

whether this sample is truly representative of the entire population of home school

students. Noting that the press had reported the results as if the sample had been

random, Welner and Welner (1999) correctly cautioned that the results may not be an

accurate portrayal of the home school population.

DISCUSSION

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ED435709 1999-09-00 The Scholastic Achievement of Home School Students. ERIC/AE

Digest.

Page 3 of 6
Even with a conservative analysis of the data, the achievement levels of the home

school students in the study were exceptional. Within each grade level and each skill

area, the median scores for home school students fell between the 70th and 80th

percentile of students nationwide and between the 60th and 70th percentile of

Catholic/Private school students. For younger students, this is a one year lead. By the

time home school students are in 8th grade, they are four years ahead of their

public/private school counterparts.

The results are consistent with previous studies of the achievement of home school

students. A 1990 national home schooling survey of 1,516 families in the United States

noted that, on average, home education families have parents with greater formal

education, more children, and higher family income (Home School Court

Report,1990).Two-parent families were the norm and they were predominantly

Christian. The average age of the children was just over eight years--a majority of the

children had never attended public or private schools. There were equal numbers of

male and female students. On standardized achievement tests, the home-schooled

students performed at or above the 80th percentile on national norms in reading,

listening, language, math, science, social studies, basic battery, and complete battery

scores.

Calvery, et al. (1992) compared the achievement of Arkansas home schooled and

public schooled students in grades 4, 7, and 10 using 6 subscales of the Metropolitan

Achievement Test. Home schooled students scored higher than their counterparts in

reading, mathematics, language, total basic battery, science, and social studies at

grade 4 and grade 7.They also scored significantly above public school means for grade

10 in reading, mathematics, total basic battery, science, and social studies, but scored

significantly lower in language.

Ray (1997) analyzed demographic and achievement data from 5,402 home school

students in 1,657 families. While Ray used a different approach to analyze achievement

data, he noted exceptionally high average achievement levels and that students with

long histories of being home schooled had higher achievement scores.

Home school students did quite well in 1998 on the ACT college entrance examination.

They had an average ACT composite score of 22.8 which is .38 standard deviations

above the national ACT average of 21.0 (ACT,1998).This places the average home

school student in the 65th percentile of all ACT test takers.

The superior performance of home school students on achievement tests can easily be

misinterpreted. This study does not demonstrate that home schooling is superior to

public or private schools. It should not be cited as evidence that our public schools are

failing. It does not indicate that children will perform better academically if they are

home schooled. The design of this study and the data do not warrant such claims. All

the comparisons of home school students with the general population and with the

private school population in this report fail to consider a myriad of differences between

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Page 4 of 6 ED435709 1999-09-00 The Scholastic Achievement of Home School Students. ERIC/AE

Digest.
home school and public school students. We have no information as to what the

achievement levels of home school students would be had they been enrolled in public

or private schools. This study only shows that a large group of parents choosing to

make a commitment to home schooling were able to provide a very successful

academic environment.

REFERENCES

ACT, Inc.(1998).The 1998 ACT High School Profile Report National Data. Iowa City, IA,

Available: http://www.act.org/news/98/98data.html

Calvery, Robert; and Others (1992).The Difference in Achievement between Home

Schooled and Public Schooled Students for Grades Four, Seven, and Ten in Arkansas.

Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Mid-South Educational Research

Association (21st, Knoxville, TN, November 11-13, 1992).

Home School Court Report (Dec. 1990). A Nationwide Study of Homeschooling.

Available from ERIC Document Reproduction Service ED 381 725.

Ray, Brian (1997). Home Education Across the United States. Purcellville, VA: Home

School Legal Defense Association. Available on-line at

http://hslda.org/media/statsandreports/ray1997/index.stm

Rudner, L. M. (1999a). Scholastic achievement and demographic characteristics of

home school students in 1998. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 7(8). [Online].

Available: http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v7n8/.

Rudner, L.M. (1999b) Home schooling works: pass it on. Purcellville, VA: Home School

Legal Defense Association. Available: http://www.hslda.org.

Welner, K.M. & K.G. Welner (1999) Contextualizing Homeschooling Data: A Response

to Rudner. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 7(8). [Online]. Available:

http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v7n13.

This digest is based on an article originally appearing in "Education Policy Analysis

Archives."

This publication was prepared with funding from the Office of Educational Research and

Improvement, U.S. Department of Education, under contract ED99CO0032. The

opinions expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect the positions or policies of

OERI or the U.S. Department of Education. Permission is granted to copy and distribute

this ERIC/AE Digest.

Title: The Scholastic Achievement of Home School Students. ERIC/AE Digest.

ERIC Resource Center www.eric.ed.gov

ED435709 1999-09-00 The Scholastic Achievement of Home School Students. ERIC/AE

Digest.

Page 5 of 6
Note: Based on an article originally appearing in the electronic journal "Education Policy

Analysis Archives."

Document Type: Information Analyses---ERIC Information Analysis Products (IAPs)

(071); Information Analyses---ERIC Digests (Selected) in Full Text (073);

Available From: ERIC Clearinghouse on Assessment and Evaluation, 1129 Shriver,

University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742; Tel: 800-464-3742 (free).

Descriptors: Academic Achievement, Elementary Secondary Education, Family

Characteristics, Home Schooling, Nontraditional Education, Parents as Teachers,

Private Education, Student Characteristics

Identifiers: ERIC Digests

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