How to Homeschool in Massachusetts: The Charles Decision, Town Policies, and Getting Started

Massachusetts is one of the least centralized homeschool states in the country. There is no statewide form, no state office that receives your paperwork, and no single checklist that applies from Pittsfield to Provincetown. What there is instead is a body of case law that sets the outer limits of what your own city or town may ask you for — and once you understand those limits, the whole process gets a lot calmer.

Who actually oversees homeschooling here

Compulsory attendance in Massachusetts comes from M.G.L. c. 76, § 1, which requires children to attend school but expressly allows instruction "in a manner approved in advance by the superintendent or the school committee." That single phrase — approved in advance — is why Massachusetts homeschooling is a local conversation.

The state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education does not approve home education programs, does not collect plans, and does not keep a registry of homeschooling families. Your paperwork goes to your own district: 351 cities and towns, each with its own habits, forms, staff, and tone. Two families three miles apart can have completely different experiences, and neither one is doing anything wrong.

The ground rules: Care and Protection of Charles

In 1987 the Supreme Judicial Court decided Care and Protection of Charles, and that case is still the framework everyone works from. It did two things at once. It confirmed that a school committee may review a home education proposal before instruction begins — and it drew a firm line around what that review may consist of.

The practical effect is that your district is entitled to ask about four things, and essentially nothing beyond them.

The four factors

1. The proposed curriculum and the amount of time devoted to teaching. A subject-by-subject description of what you intend to cover, plus a general sense of the instructional time you expect.
2. The competency of the parents to teach. The court was explicit that no teaching certificate and no college degree may be required. Districts may consider parent competency, but they may not impose credentials.
3. The textbooks, workbooks, and other instructional aids to be used. These can be described in general terms. You are naming the kind of materials you plan to use, not signing a purchase order.
4. The method of evaluating progress, agreed upon in advance. Standardized testing, a portfolio of dated work, or a written progress report — one method, mutually agreed.

If a request from your district does not map onto one of those four, it is worth asking politely what it is based on.

Eleven years later: Brunelle v. Lynn

Brunelle v. Lynn Public Schools (1998) answered the question Charles left open: can a district require a home visit as a condition of approval? The Supreme Judicial Court said no. Observation of your home, your classroom setup, or your day cannot be made a prerequisite for approving a home education plan.

Between the two cases you get a useful mental model. Charles describes what a district may reasonably ask. Brunelle describes the door it may not walk through.

Time on learning: 180 days and 900–990 hours

You will see these numbers everywhere in Massachusetts homeschool conversations: 180 days per year, 900 hours of instruction at the elementary level, 990 at the secondary level. They come from the state's time-on-learning regulations for public schools, and districts commonly use them as a reference point when reviewing plans.

Two things are worth being clear about. First, these are the benchmark most districts have in mind, so it is genuinely useful to track days and hours and be able to state a number. Second, home education is not required to mirror a public school's calendar hour-for-hour — the standard in practice is instruction reasonably comparable in time and scope, not a punch card. Learning at the kitchen table, at the library, in the car on the way to a co-op, and on a Saturday afternoon all count.

The families who find this easiest are the ones who log a little each day rather than reconstructing a year in June.

Required subjects

Your plan should cover the subjects taught in local public schools at your child's level. In practice that means reading and language arts, mathematics, science, history and social studies including the constitutions of the United States and Massachusetts, health, and physical education. How you cover them is yours to decide.

The order to do things in

1. If your child is currently enrolled, write your education plan first. Have the plan ready before you notify the school, so the two arrive close together and there is no gap that looks like an unexplained absence.
2. Find the right person. In most towns it is the superintendent's office; in larger cities it is often a designated home education contact or a student services office. Ask directly who receives home education plans.
3. Submit your plan. Send it in writing, keep a dated copy, and use a method that gives you proof of delivery. That dated copy is the most useful piece of paper in a Massachusetts homeschool file.
4. Wait for a response, and start. A family that has filed a complete plan in good faith and is waiting on a district review is generally not treated as truant. Keep a record of the correspondence.
5. Log as you go. Days, hours, subjects, and a few work samples. This is what makes the end of the year uneventful.
6. Provide your agreed evaluation at year's end. For most families that is a written progress report.
7. Refile for next year. The statute does not set a renewal schedule, but annual refiling is standard district practice and the second year takes a fraction of the time.

What Massachusetts does not require

• No teaching certificate, degree, or credential for the parent.
• No home visits or classroom inspections as a condition of approval.
• No MCAS participation and no mandatory standardized testing.
• No district-chosen textbooks or curriculum.
• No state-issued form — you write your own plan.
• No quarterly reports, and no stacking several evaluation methods on top of each other.

Starting mid-year

Nothing in the law ties you to September. Families withdraw in October, January, and April every year. The process is identical: write the plan, submit it, keep your copy. If you are pulling a child out of a school they are currently enrolled in, submitting the plan and the withdrawal notice together is the cleanest sequence.

Where to go next

Read the Massachusetts requirements guide for the full breakdown, and use find your district to figure out where your plan goes. When you are ready to write the plan itself, our guide on writing a Massachusetts education plan walks through it section by section.

This article is general guidance, not legal advice. Massachusetts home education is governed locally — always confirm specifics with your own district.