More North Dakota parents choosing to homeschool this year

Published: Aug. 9, 2022 at 6:09 PM CDT

BISMARCK, N.D. (KFYR) - More North Dakota parents are turning to homeschooling. Throughout the pandemic, some families opted to keep their children home, which has continued this year.

Joe Kolosky with the North Dakota Department of Public Instruction says they’ve been getting an influx of phone calls on homeschooling compared to other years. This year has the highest rates of students enrolled in home education North Dakota has ever seen.

“I say there’s a mix, I think one of the big reasons is they started to home educate, and they actually really liked it, and they learned how to do it, and so they kept their student home and kept other children home that were younger siblings or older siblings,” Kolosky said.

Kassie Hanson, a mom in Bismarck, homeschooled her daughter for pre-K but will have her attend public school in the fall.

“To me, both homeschooling and in a classroom setting is so important. So I like to give balance. I like that I get to learn where her struggles are and where her strengths are,” Hanson said.

Hannah Mcdonald is a Bismarck mom who works for Bismarck Public Schools. She has the opportunity to teach her own kids.

“There’s such a community that gets built in their classrooms it’s really kind of exciting to see them work together or so much emphasis on social and emotional learning,” Mcdonald said.

Kristy Rose, president of the Tri-City Home Educators Association, says more people have been choosing to home educate for the freedom, flexibility, and differing opinions with the state of education.

“There’s definitely those who started doing school at home through the public school system that saw what education looked like and saw what homeschooling could look like and definitely decided to make the change, so that’s probably a contribution,” Rose said.

Rose also says there has been an increase of people switching to homeschooling steadily over the past five years, and three years ago, it doubled. In North Dakota, school educated children are required 175 days a year of schooling at four hours a day. This year the North Dakota Department of Public Instruction estimates more than 5,000 students will be school educated this year.

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