Homeschooling In Maine

Right now, homeschooling in Maine is not that hard. I say right now. If you are interested in seeing what is going on at this moment with homeschooling in Maine I highly suggest your read This Article from the HSLDA.

Requirements to Homeschool in Maine:

In Maine, you are required to notify the school district and state that you are homeschooling. You need to file a letter of intent to homeschool every year starting at the age of 6. You need to send this letter to the Department of Education and your local superintendent’s office every single year. Up until this year (2019) the age was 7, but the government of Maine decided to lower the compulsatory age to go to school to age 6, this resulted in homeschoolers also having to file a year earlier. So remember if you are homeschooling in Maine you need to file your letter of intent to homeschool starting at age 6.

Also regarding the letter of intent to homeschool. Once you enter your child into the public school system but then you decide to homeschool you still need to send a letter of intent. If that is before age 6 or in the middle of the year, regardless of age, you must follow the same rules and file every year thereafter. This is important to remember when you use the Kindergarten or PreK programs at the public level. Once you enroll them you will have to file your letter of intent earlier than just age 6.

HSLDA and HOME have sample letters of intent that you can use. Do not use the Maine Department of Education forms that are on their website because they ask for more information than you are required to share. No need to share more than the law states.

Next is progress.

Once you file that initial letter of intent you will need to track progress. This is the easiest of them all. You have two options for this.

A: Portfolio Review by a Maine Certified Teacher.

B: Standardized Test.

I will start with option A.

A portfolio review by a Maine certified teacher is a very popular route and easy. A portfolio showing progress can be anything you and the teacher you are working with choose. A popular option in just keeping work done in a binder. Homeschoolers of Maine provides portfolio reviews and group portfolio reviews. Some people use online portfolio options. Do what works for you and the teacher you are working with. You also need to homeschool for a minimum of 175 days. Use those days at your discretion (field trips, studying, library, co-op, etc). Your chosen teacher or HOME reviews your portfolio, writes a letter stating you met the required days and your student showed progress, and whatever else you want to be included, and then that part is done.

What do you do with the letter?

First things first, keep the original copy of that letter.

You need to include that letter when you file your intent to homeschool again. This is your subsequent letter to homeschool.

Remember, you need to send a letter of intent to the department of education and to your local superintendent’s office every single year you are homeschooling.

After the first year you are homeschooling you need to send in a letter from a Maine certified teacher with your intent to homeschool notice. Include your review letter with your letter of intent to homeschool to the superintendent’s office and to the department of education.

Lily with Maine Congressman Jared Golden at the Lincoln Memorial Library. Lily wrote a letter to Congressman Golden about the importance of libraries.

Option B: Standardized Test

You choose the test. Any standardized test you want to use. Whatever that test is, and there are a million options, you use. Have your homeschooler take that test, do whatever the test tells you to do to receive the results, and get those scores.
Keep a copy of the results for your records. Send a copy of those results with your letter of intent to homeschool that you send to the department of education and to the superintendent’s office.

You need to choose one of these options every year you are homeschooling.

OR

You can use a RAPPS/NAPS these are recognized private schools. These types of private homeschool schools send your letter of intent to homeschool for you and take out the work of having a progress report or testing. But there are fees, structures, and strings attached to this option chosen for your homeschool needs. You need to do your heavy research and see if this is an option that works for you. This type of structure may not work for you and to the public school sector, it is considered private schooling which can be an issue if your student plays school sports, take one class at school, band, chorus, after school programs, etc. Also, according to HOME, these schools have to follow the new vaccine mandate law Maine has adopted.

Maine also has one online public schooling option. It starts in 7th grade and runs through high school. You must follow all the same laws and guidelines that are in place for public schools in Maine. School is in session during school hours, they have teachers, and you are following the traditional school year. At the moment Maine uses the Connection Academy.

Subjects to Cover:

In Maine you are required to cover certain subjects.

Every year you need to cover: English, Language Arts, Math, Social Studies, PE, Health Education, Library Skills, Fine Arts.

Once during grades 6-12 you need to cover Maine Studies.

Once during grade 7-12 the student needs to prove a proficiency use in computers.

Again, cover these how you see fit. HOME will support you in the best way or the teacher you chose to do your review.

So I covered the law of homeschooling in Maine. It is really easy, even though I went into a lot of details, hopefully to eliminate questions.

I’ll get to the fun stuff now. Resources!

The Quest Club raising money for the Lemonade Stand Foundation

Homeschool Organizations:

HOME: Homeschoolers of Maine: https://www.homeschoolersofmaine.org

Facebook Groups:

Facebook Pages:

Twitter:

Pinterest:

Homeschool Co-Ops:

Homeschool Event and Field Trip Listings:

Other Resources I Recommend:

Need homeschooling information on another state? Learn more in the Homeschooling In All 50 States series.

Ashley Mitchell

Ashley is the writer of the blog the Happy Homeschooling Mum and the author of “Lost Poems of a Functioning Mother“. She is a homeschooling mother to 5 children with a dog and cat in tow. She writes motherhood encouragement, lesson plans, and homeschooling resources and is a guest blogger on the topic of infant loss. She is a loss, postpartum, and labor doula and lactation consultant and has an MA of Teaching Ministries and BA of Homeschooling Ministries and Career Counseling. She is an avid volunteer in her community and enjoys being outside and living in the library. Ashely’s second book Summer Haikus from Lincoln will be available from County Road Press in September 2019.

https://happyhomeschoolingmum.com/

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