Many private educational institutions offer curricular packages, books, and other materials for use in home schooling. Several states have innovative learning options. In Alaska, teachers in Juneau work with students located all over the state, staying in touch by mail, telephone, and through occasional home visits. In California, children can enroll in an independent-study program through a public school then base their studies in the home. Washington and Iowa require public schools to enroll children on a part-time basis if they apply.
People disagree on whether home schooling is advantageous academically.
Research has not determined whether the same children would perform better or worse in a public or private classroom, or in a home-schooling arrangement. Analyses of test scores are available, based on data from states that require testing or from home-schooling associations. Data from both sources may not be representative of home schoolers as a whole, however, because not all families cooperate with state testing requirements and private efforts rely on volunteers. Keeping these caveats in mind, virtually all the available data show that the group of home-schooled children who are tested is above average. The pattern for children for whom data are available resembles that of children in private schools.