Brian D. Ray, Ph.D.

June 7, 2016

The SAT 2014 test scores of college-bound homeschool students were higher than the national average of all college-bound seniors that same year. Some 13,549 homeschool seniors had the following mean scores: 567 in critical reading, 521 in mathematics, and 535 in writing (College Board, 2014a). The mean SAT scores for all college-bound seniors in 2014 were 497 in critical reading, 513 in mathematics, and 487 in writing (College Board, 2014b). The homeschool students’ SAT scores were 0.61 standard deviation higher in reading, 0.26 standard deviation higher in mathematics, and 0.42 standard deviation higher in writing than those of all college-bound seniors taking the SAT, and these are notably large differences.

There were some demographic differences between homeschool students and all students taken together. First, the family incomes of the homeschool students were similar to those of all students. Regarding ethnicity, for example, 72 percent of the homeschool students were White, 5 percent were Asian, Asian American, or Pacific Islander, and 4 percent were Black or African American, while of all college-bound seniors, the corresponding percentages were 49, 12, and 13. The average highest level of parental education was notably higher for the homeschool students than for all students.

This point-in-time description of SAT scores simply shows that the test scores of homeschool students are higher than the national average for all students. No careful analysis has been done of these scores to determine whether certain background variables might statistically explain the differences in scores. These relatively high SAT scores of home-educated students are consistent with their high SAT scores in preceding research and with research findings on the overall success of college students who were home educated (Gloeckner & Jones, 2013; Murphy, 2012; Ray & Eagleson, 2008).

References

College Board. (2014a). SAT 2014 college-bound seniors state profile report, U.S. home school students. New York, NY: Author.

College Board. (2014b). SAT 2014 college-bound seniors total group profile report, total group. New York, NY: Author. Retrieved June 7, 2016 from https://secure-media.collegeboard.org/digitalServices/pdf/sat/TotalGroup-2014.pdf

Gloeckner, Gene W., & Jones, Paul. (2013). Reflections on a decade of changes in homeschooling and homeschooled into higher education. Peabody Journal of Education, 88(3), 309-323.

Murphy, Joseph. (2012). Homeschooling in America: Capturing and assessing the movement. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin, a Sage Company.

Ray, Brian D., & Eagleson, Bruce K. (2008, August 14). State regulation of homeschooling and homeschoolers’ SAT scores. Journal of Academic Leadership, 6(3). Retrieved March 4, 2013 fromhttp://contentcat.fhsu.edu/cdm/compoundobject/collection/p15732coll4/id/303/rec/1