How to Homeschool in Louisiana (2026): The BESE Application, Renewal, and What the Law Requires

Louisiana's Home School Law

Louisiana Revised Statutes §17:236.1 provides the legal framework for home study. Louisiana recognizes two ways to educate a child at home, and this guide covers the first: the BESE-approved home study program, which is the route most families take. The second, registering as a nonpublic school not seeking state approval, runs under different rules and is covered in our guide to withdrawing from public school in Louisiana.

An approved home study program rests on one standard and one process. The standard is that parents use a sustained curriculum of quality at least equal to that offered by public schools at the same grade level. The process is an application to the Louisiana Department of Education, filed within 15 days of the day your program begins and renewed each year. Everything else follows from those two.

Louisiana's compulsory school age runs from 5 through 18. A child in that range needs to be enrolled in a public or nonpublic school, or participating in a BESE-approved home study program. R.S. 17:221 says a child enrolled in an approved home study program "shall be considered in compliance with the school attendance provisions," so the enrolment is the compliance. There is no separate day count to meet on top of it.

This is an approval process rather than a filing, which is a real difference from how this page used to describe it. The department reviews what you send and issues an official approval or denial letter, and review takes up to 14 business days. On the initial application there is no curriculum to review, since the only document you attach is a birth certificate. On renewal the department does look at evidence that your program met the standard. What it never does is pick your curriculum: it keeps no list of approved programs or materials, recommends no publisher, and makes no judgment about the grade level you set.

Applying to the Department

File the initial application no later than 15 days after your home study program begins. That deadline attaches to the start of your program, not to a date on the calendar and not to the day your child leaves a school. There is no September 1 deadline in Louisiana home study, whatever you may have read here before.

The application goes to the Louisiana Department of Education through its online system, or on paper where a family cannot get online. It asks for the child's name, grade level and date of birth; the parent or guardian's name, telephone number, mailing address and parish; the type and name of the school previously attended; an immunization statement covering meningococcal disease for children who are 11, which the guidelines let you satisfy instead with a religious or personal exemption statement or a letter from a physician; and an assurance statement in which you confirm you are the parent or guardian, that the information is true, and that you will comply with §17:236.1. A certified copy of the child's birth certificate goes with the initial application. Do not mail an original.

Then it renews. File the renewal by October 1 of the school year, or within 12 months of your initial approval, whichever falls later, and again when your child is ready to move up a grade. An approval runs for one year from its date, for the grade level on the application. Keep the approval letter somewhere you can reach quickly: it is the document your child needs at the Office of Motor Vehicles for a learner's permit or driver's license, and it answers a district that asks about enrollment.

Nothing in this goes to your city or parish superintendent. Districts do receive a monthly copy of their own district's home study approval letters from the department under R.S. 17:3913, so your parish learns of your program without you writing to it.

There Is No Parent Credential Requirement

Louisiana sets no diploma, GED or teaching certificate requirement for the parent who teaches. The department's guidelines say it in one line: a parent or tutor may be permitted to provide the instruction, and there are no teaching certification requirements. The application asks for your name, your contact details and your assurance. It does not ask what schooling you had.

This page said the opposite until August 2026, and we were wrong. The claim sat in the summary, the table, this section and the FAQ, and no source stood behind any of it. If you have been holding off on homeschooling in Louisiana because you thought you needed a diploma you do not have, nothing was in your way.

Days, Hours, and the Records You Keep

Louisiana sets no minimum number of days and no minimum number of hours for a home study program. An earlier version of this page said you had to hit a day count each year. That was wrong, and it was the second thing on this page that made Louisiana sound heavier than it is. The home study statute contains no day or hour figure, the compulsory attendance statute contains none either, and the Louisiana Department of Education's own guidelines say the same. What the compulsory attendance law asks is that a child between 5 and 18 is enrolled somewhere, and R.S. 17:221 treats a child in an approved home study program as already compliant.

So a four-day week, a long break, or a year-round schedule breaks no rule. What does carry weight is the renewal, where you show that your program offered a sustained curriculum of quality at least equal to public schools at the same grade level. Records make that easy rather than stressful: a calendar with school days marked, a lesson planner, a folder of work samples as you go. You do not send any of it in on a schedule. It is what you draw on when the renewal comes around.

The Renewal: Three Ways to Show Progress

Each renewal asks you to show that your program offered a sustained curriculum of quality at least equal to that offered by public schools at the same grade level. The department accepts three kinds of evidence, and the choice is yours every year. An earlier version of this page listed two of them and left out the one that asks the least of a family.

Option 1: A Curriculum Packet

Upload a packet of materials showing what you did. The department's own examples are ordinary: a simple outline of the subjects taught during the year, a list of the books and materials used, a statement from a third party such as a relative or friend who observed your child's progress, one or two pages of your child's work per core subject, and a report card or copies of standardized tests. No test is required and no outside professional has to sign anything.

For most families this is the lightest route, and it builds itself if you drop things into one folder as the year goes. Note also what it does not carry: no score threshold and no gatekeeper to find.

Option 2: Standardized Test Scores

Submit verification that your child took a standardized examination and either scored at or above grade level, or progressed at a rate equal to one grade level for each year in the home study program. The department names several it accepts: the iLEAP English language arts and math tests for grades 3, 5, 6, 7 and 9, the Louisiana LEAP for grades 4 and 8, End of Course exams for grades 9 to 12, the ACT, the California Achievement Test, the Stanford, the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, and the SAT.

Watch the bar this option sets, because the packet route sets none. If a standardized test is likely to understate what your child knows, a weak score becomes part of your renewal rather than a private data point. You can also arrange state testing through your local school board's testing coordinator in early January, for a fee of up to $35, though nothing requires you to.

Option 3: A Certified Teacher's Statement

A teacher certified to teach at your child's grade level examines the program you are offering and states, in their professional opinion, that your child is being taught in accordance with a sustained curriculum of quality at least equal to that offered by public schools at the same grade level. For a child with disabilities the comparison is to what public schools offer children with similar disabilities. Any such evaluation is subject to review and approval by the state board.

Finding a certified Louisiana teacher takes lead time. Home school co-ops, local private schools and Louisiana home school organizations can point you to reviewers. Ask in the fall rather than the spring, so you are choosing a reviewer rather than taking whoever is left.

What "Equivalent Instruction" Means in Louisiana

Louisiana's statute does not list specific required subjects. Instead, it requires that the home school program provide a "sustained curriculum of a quality at least equal to that offered by the public schools." That is a quality test rather than a checklist. Most families end up covering English language arts, mathematics, science and social studies at a level consistent with the child's grade and age, because that is what public schools cover and the comparison runs to them, but Louisiana names no subject and asks for no particular list. Louisiana does not require alignment to state curriculum frameworks, use of specific textbook publishers, or exact grade-level content sequencing.

Most established home school curriculum packages address all the core areas and meet this standard without additional effort. If you design your own curriculum, build it on a foundation of language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies, and supplement with any additional subjects you choose: foreign language, fine arts, physical education, logic, coding, or electives that fit your student's interests or college preparation goals. The statute asks for quality; it does not prescribe the exact path.

Withdrawing from a Louisiana Public School

For the full step-by-step, see our guide to withdrawing from public school in Louisiana. The short version: you can withdraw whenever you decide to, and nothing in Louisiana's home study law makes it conditional on a document or an approval from the school. The Louisiana Department of Education suggests applying for home study before you withdraw, but families may withdraw before approval arrives. Your deadline attaches to the application rather than to the withdrawal. It goes to the department no later than 15 days after your home study program begins.

If your child has an Individualized Education Program, the IEP belongs to that public school enrollment and ends with it. What follows is a federal question rather than a Louisiana one: under the rules for parentally placed private school children, 34 C.F.R. Sections 300.130 to 300.144, a child taught at home has no individual right to FAPE, the entitlement an IEP carries inside a public school, and what a district offers instead comes out of a proportionate share of federal funds spread across that whole group. An earlier version of this page said the Louisiana Department of Education states that home study students do not qualify under IDEA, Section 504 or the ADA. We could not find the department saying that in writing, so we are not attributing it to them. Call your local education agency and ask what they offer a home-studied child, while your child is still enrolled and the file is open. Keep copies of the IEP and every evaluation whatever the answer, because those documents are yours.

Louisiana School Choice and Home School Funding

Louisiana funds no part of a home study program. The LDOE's home study guidelines state that parents are responsible for all approved home study program related costs and that a student in a BESE-approved home study program cannot participate in the LA GATOR Scholarship Program. Act 1 of the 2024 Regular Session bars both of Louisiana's homeschool routes from the scholarship, the BESE-approved program and the nonpublic school not seeking state approval. LA GATOR carries a home-based education option, but that is a status inside the scholarship rather than a homeschool status, and taking it means leaving home study rather than adding to it. Our LA GATOR and Louisiana homeschooling guide works through what the law says and what the choice costs either way. A reading and academic assessment before you pick curriculum gives you a factual starting point, which matters more when you are paying for the year yourself. One thing the guidelines do not mention: Louisiana allows a state income tax deduction for home-schooling under R.S. 47:297.11, worth 50% of what you spend on textbooks and curricula, capped at a $6,000 deduction per child. It is a deduction rather than a payment, so at Louisiana's flat 3% income tax the most it saves is about $180 a year per child, and a more usual $600 curriculum year saves around $9. Small, yearly, and yours to claim.

High School, Transcripts, and Diplomas in Louisiana

Louisiana does not set graduation requirements or diploma standards for home study families under §17:236.1. You establish the requirements, track credits through grades 9 to 12, and issue the diploma yourself. The department is clear that home study diplomas are not awarded by BESE or by the department, and that you must not put a state seal or state wording on one. What the statute gives you is weight: a diploma awarded by a BESE-approved home study program is deemed by all public postsecondary institutions, state departments, agencies, boards and commissions, and all other state and local government bodies, to carry the rights and privileges of a diploma from a state-approved nonpublic school. That equivalence attaches to the approved status. A diploma from a nonpublic school not seeking state approval does not carry it.

TOPS is the other reason the approved status matters. Under R.S. 17:5029 a student must be enrolled in a BESE-approved home study program for both eleventh and twelfth grade to be eligible, and then the ACT score sets the award level. For BESE-approved home study students, LOSFA's award pages state a 24 for TOPS Performance and a 28 for TOPS Honors, each one point above the standard score and granted in place of the core units and grade average a schooled applicant has to show. For TOPS Opportunity and TOPS Tech the award pages carry no home study line, and the only figures LOSFA publishes for home study students sit on its home study page, at 20 and 17. Opportunity's standard moves with the prior year state average and never falls below 20, so treat 20 as a floor rather than a fixed target. Confirm all four with LOSFA for your student's graduation year. If your student previously attended a Louisiana public or nonpublic high school, that school has to certify they were in good standing when they last attended. TOPS is run by the Louisiana Office of Student Financial Assistance rather than by the department, so take TOPS questions to LOSFA.

Louisiana State University, Tulane University, and Louisiana's public university system are experienced reviewing home school applications. Most ask for ACT scores alongside the parent-issued transcript. Louisiana is an ACT-focused state: most high school students sit for the ACT, and home school applicants should plan for it beginning in grade 10 or 11. A well-organized transcript listing courses by name, credit hours, and grades by year is the standard document. For competitive programs, brief course descriptions that explain the content covered strengthen the application.

Louisiana's community and technical colleges are broadly accessible to home school graduates. Dual enrollment for high school students is available at many Louisiana institutions; contact the specific institution for their home school applicant requirements. The full planning guide walks through building a high school transcript, planning dual enrollment, and preparing the full college application file from a Louisiana home school. For the full step-by-step on diplomas, TOPS, and dual enrollment, see our guide to homeschooling high school in Louisiana.

A Note from Homeschool Teacher Guide: What This Really Means for You

Louisiana is lighter than this page used to make it sound, and in one place it was heavier than the law allows. There is no parent credential. There is no September 1 notice and no letter to your parish superintendent. What there is: an application to the department within 15 days of starting, and a renewal by October 1 each year after that.

So the calendar is short. Start your program, file the application inside the fifteen days, and put the approval letter where you can find it, because your child will need it at the Office of Motor Vehicles one day. Through the year, drop work samples, a book list and a subject outline into a single folder. That folder is a complete renewal on its own, and having it means you never have to choose between booking a test and hunting for a certified teacher in the spring. Put October 1 in the calendar. That is the whole of it.