What courses are available to meet college requirements?
Remember, you can always design your own course. Most homeschoolers don't pick just one type of course to meet all their needs. They may select an online course with a teacher for Algebra, a local co-op class for biology, a packaged course for English, and develop their own reading list for history.
Package Courses or Curriculum
This includes courses from providers such as Sonlight, Alpha Omega, Apologia, and KONOS. These generally include all of the teacher and student material. It can be difficult to find strictly secular curriculum.
Distance Education
These classes can be online or by mail. The student is responsible to an assigned teacher and receives grades from that teacher. You should be wary of "free" online programs. Often these are charter school programs that would obligate you to follow public school rules and accountability. This is not always the case, though. For example, Florida residents can take classes at the Florida Virtual High School without cost whether the student is in public school, private school, or homeschool. Taking a class does not affect their overall status.
Dual Credit
Students in Texas can enroll in
community college courses beginning their junior year and take classes for dual credit. This means they receive both high school and college credit for the same class. However, an increasing number of colleges are only allowing students to count the classes for either high school credit or college credit but not both.
Advanced Placement Courses
Advanced Placement (AP) Classes are high school courses that are taught at the college level. Students taking the class should be prepared to take the AP Exam offered by the College Board. Any class that has an AP designation must be approved by the College Board. Homeschoolers can submit their own AP Course plan or can enroll in an online AP Class.
You may not want to use AP Classes for all four years of English, Social Studies, or Science since these are college level courses. These classes generally assume the student has completed the equivalent of one year of high school credit for the subject.
AP Course Providers
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