Home Schooling In Alaska: Extreme Experiments In Home Education

Abstract

This study explores the history of home schooling in Alaska. The 49<super> th</super> state offers an unusual degree of freedom from regulation that allows diverse and innovative experiments in home education to flourish. Currently, Alaskan home schoolers enjoy more freedom to practice their craft than in any other state of the United States. <p> Alaska has never had enough money to deliver quality education to its children. Trying to establish an education system, to serve a small population scattered over more than half-a-million square miles, required the development of innovative methods: one of these was home schooling. Home schooling provides a low cost answer to educate Alaska's children, and became an accepted institution in Alaskan education. Today home schooling continues to deliver lower cost education to both the remote and urban student, in the North, but also offers myriad options for parents who demand more and greater flexibility in educating their children. <p>