Community Outreach
Want to help homeschooling integrate into the community at large? Are you a homeschool group leader who talks with the media or provides information to new and curious homeschoolers? Here are tips to help you present homeschooling to the public and the media.
Community Outreach: Talking About Homeschooling
The Case for Homeschooling
The public schools are beyond repair. If it is not practical to replace the current system, then at least let those alone who wish to homeschool. Hassle them not. Instead, encourage them and help them. Parents who homeschool their children have three basic complaints against public schools: the lack of academic rigor, the number of maladjusted graduates, and the anti-religious atmosphere. Homeschool advocates claim that homeschooling overcomes these problems. They argue that no matter whether the educational philosophy one holds is that schooling prepares for life or schooling is life, the homeschooled do better. Proponents also claim that private schools are nearly always similar to public schools, so the fundamental criticisms of public schools apply to private schools also, although to a lesser degree.
Product Reviews on Homeschool Blogs: How to Get Them
How to get bloggers interested in your products so that they will write product reviews on their homeschool blogs -- have an outstanding product first of all and give bloggers incentives. Find social media savvy homeschool bloggers on Twitter and G+ using two special hashtags.
Marketing to the Homeschool Audience
The homeschool niche is unique and has its own quirks. This youtube video shares ten tips for marketing your product or service to homeschool parents.
Homeschooling Advocacy: Know the Law
It may not sound quite as exciting or glamorous as marching in the streets, calling your congressman, or making speeches. But the single most important and most empowering thing any homeschooling parent can do is to become familiar with Virginia’s homeschooling laws.
Thirteen Ways to Help Your Library Help Homeschoolers
If you’re looking for a way to provide a service for homeschoolers in your community, consider becoming a liaison between your library and homeschoolers. Create activities and events for a homeschool audience. Help establish a homeschool resource center within the library. Coordinate with the library to have a Homeschool Day. Help the library find volunteers. Be an intermediary between the homeschool community and the library. And support your library's budget needs.
7 Tips to Help Explain Your Homeschool Decision with Confidence
Many homeschoolers are confronted with negativity. Heated debates on public education, religion and politics can be incited. Facing arguments on socialization, teacher qualifications and homework are not uncommon. There will always be naysayers. You simply cannot please everyone all the time, especially when you make important family decisions. It is best to convey your decision with confidence and let the act of homeschooling tell the rest of the tale.
Homeschooling Advocacy: Know the Players in Your Community
Homeschooling laws and policies don’t come out of thin air. They are created by well-intentioned men and women who may not know much about homeschooling. Laws and policies can be created, eliminated, or improved if we work with these men and women to fix them. Effective advocates know who these men and women are, know where to find them, and know how they can help with homeschooling problems.
Government Affairs Team
The Organization of Virginia Homeschoolers (VaHomeschoolers) has lobbied on behalf of Virginia’s diverse homeschooling community for over a decade.
Homeschooling Advocacy: Know How to Write an Effective Letter or Email
Positive action can be taken by homeschoolers by writing a letter or email to explain your concerns and providing accurate information about homeschooling. Letters or emails are especially appropriate in response to a form letter, a survey, an email, or a newspaper article or editorial. Letters and emails are also an effective way to express your views to lawmakers or policymakers on a particular homeschooling issue.
Homeschooling Advocacy: Know Your Local Policies
Locate the homeschooling policies and regulations for your local school district. Read the policies carefully to learn about how your school district handles homeschooling issues. Make copies of the policies and keep them in a safe place for future reference. Share what you’ve learned withyour family and friends.
Nine Ways to Make Your Public Library More Homeschool-Friendly
The number of homeschoolers has grown seven times faster than the number of students attending public schools over the last couple of decades. What does this mean for public libraries? Homeschooling families have always turned to libraries to supplement their educational needs, so as homeschooling increases nationwide, the number of homeschooling patrons will increase as well. There are several steps your public library can take to become more homeschool-friendly.
Be an Advocate for Homeschooling in Virginia
Just as educational philosophies and approaches can vary significantly among homeschooling families, so, too can our degree of comfort with and interest in taking the role of a “homeschool advocate.” While some homeschooling parents feel driven to right wrongs in the world or to push for change for the better, others prefer to avoid conflict if at all possible, and many of us fall somewhere in between, willing to take on important issues that hit close to home, if only we knew how to go about it effectively. Nearly all of us, however, want to be able to effectively respond if we feel our homeschooling freedoms are being abridged or threatened in some way. VaHomeschoolers has prepared some resources to help you advocate for yourself and the homeschooling community. Even if you never find yourself in an advocacy situation, this information can help to empower you to be a more confident homeschooler.
What is a Media Kit and How Do I Make One?
A media kit is a document you provide to potential advertisers and other parties you are interested in working with information about your value as a partner. It is meant to reflect your reach as a blogger. A media kit can be as simple as an ad page with basic blog and social media numbers or as complex as a full-blown demographic study of your readers printed and bound. Whatever kind of media kit you choose to create, remember to be clear and concise.
Homeschooling Advocacy Step by Step
Advocacy is for everyone. Any concerned parent can become an advocate for homeschooling freedoms. And so can you. This series of five articles will walk you through the steps you can take to become an effective advocate for homeschooling in your community.
Homeschooling Advocacy: Know How to Write Effective Talking Points
It’s not enough to plan a meeting to talk about homeschooling with lawmakers, policymakers, bureaucrats, or the media. You have to have something to say when you get to the meeting. Successful homeschooling advocates get around this problem with a secret weapon: talking points.
An Open Letter to My Non-Homeschooling Friends
It can be difficult for friends to understand the changes and challenges a homeschooling family faces. This mom shares her reasons for homeschooling and why her relationship with them is different now.
Can Your Children Explain Why They Homeschool?
Every child is asked a thousand questions in his growing-up years. If that child happens to be homeschooled the tally rises to a million fairly quickly! You know how it is--you can't go through the check-out line in the grocery store without you and your children being riddled with questions. Homeschooled children are questioned by friends, by relatives, by people at church, by strangers, and occasionally by a TV reporter or a legislator. And sometimes well-meaning friends and relatives can't wait to get your children alone so they can find out what they really think and feel. You will be doing your children and yourself a great service if you teach them how to handle questions in a graceful, confident, knowledgeable way.
Featured Resources

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Learning Styles: Reaching Everyone God Gave You to Teach
This book offers helpful and practical strategies about the different ways that kids acquire information and learn, and then use that knowledge. Kids' behavior is often tied to a particular learning style and understanding that fact will help parents respond to their child in ways that decrease frustration and increase success, especially in a homeschooling environment. 
Alpha-Phonics
Alpha Phonics is a primer for beginning readers. It features 128 self-explanatory lessons, printed in large, clear calligraphy suitable for beginning readers. You'll find product information about Alpha-Phonics here.
The Case for Classical Christian Education
Douglas Wilson looks at the state of America's school system and offers a remedy for those who are committed to their children's best interests in education. Wilson details the history of the classical education movement and discusses what is needed for a useful curriculum. Readers will come to understand that classical education offers the best opportunity for academic achievement, character growth, and spiritual education. 
Homeschool Bravely: How to Squash Doubt, Trust God, and Teach Your Child with Confidence
It's time to change your perspective to transform the way you plan, teach, and homeschool. This book helps you to see homeschooling as a calling. With this mindset, you'll be able to dismiss the stress of impossible expectations. Find strategies to help you juggle the logistics of homeschooling with different ages, be a good support for a struggling learner, set realistic goals, dismiss the guilt, and weather any criticism. You can be a hopeful homeschooler! God uses all for good and can transfo...
Real-Life Homeschooling: The Stories of 21 Families Who Teach Their Children at Home
The book that shows homeschooling in action! What does it really mean when parents say they homeschool their child or children? For Rhonda Barfield -- a homeschooler for the past 10 years -- the definition is as diverse as the 21 families she studies in this eye-opening book. Real-Life Homeschooling From the city to the country, apartments to split-levels, you'll enter each household and see education in action. Discover the challenges and rewards of tailoring instruction to each child's nee...