Senate File 69/House File 355: Home Schools Mandates and Reporting Requirements Reduction

If passed, these bills would substantially reduce reporting requirements for homeschool families and would thus extend homeschool freedom in Minnesota. The bill would make the following changes:

1) Limit annual notification reporting to one-time reporting when a family starts homeschooling, or when they move; subsequent renewals would be a simple letter of “intent to continue” with any updated information.
2) Give students the option to take a nationally recognized college entrance exam in lieu of a standardized achievement test;
3) Eliminate the requirement that parents obtain additional evaluation of a student's abilities should the student scores below the 30th percentile;
4) Eliminates annual visit by superintendent;
5) Eliminate the requirement that parents submit an annual instructional calendar;
6) Eliminate the requirement that parents without certain qualifications submit quarterly reports;
7) Require parents to simply maintain (vs. make available) documentation that the student is being taught the required subjects;
8) Allow a parent to certify that a student is presently engaged in home education for the purposes of taking home-classroom driver training;
9) Allow the person in charge of providing instruction in a homeschool to issue an employment certificate;
10) Limit immunization reporting requirements to only the first year of homeschooling and the 7th grade year;