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🚀 How to Start Homeschooling in Missouri

The first steps for a Missouri family starting to homeschool: what to file, how to leave a public school, and where to find co-ops, classes and help — drawn from our Missouri guide and articles.

What Missouri offers homeschool families, and what it doesn't

Missouri's home school law is short and leaves the parent in charge. There is no notice to the state, no testing and no approval. The law forbids any state department from dictating a statewide curriculum for home schools or FPE schools, and it says nothing in the attendance law requires a home school to teach anything that conflicts with its religious doctrine (RSMo 167.031). DESE says it provides no supplies, funding or information about home schooling.

Read the full section in our Missouri guide

Homeschooling in Missouri: the basics

What a home school is: under RSMo 167.012 (as amended effective August 28, 2025), a home school is a school, incorporated or not, whose primary purpose is private or religious-based instruction. It enrolls children between 7 and the compulsory attendance age, no more than four of whom are unrelated to each other (within the third degree). It does not charge tuition or fees. It does not enroll MOScholars students and is not an FPE school.
Compulsory age: 7 to 17, or until the student has completed 16 credits toward high school graduation (RSMo 167.031). For home schools and FPE schools, a completed credit means 100 or more hours of instruction in a course. Children 5 to 7 don't have to be in school, but if you enroll them in public school they must attend regularly unless you ask in writing that they be dropped from the rolls. Missouri's school year runs July 1 to June 30.
Hours: offer at least 1,000 hours of instruction. At least 600 must be in reading, language arts, mathematics, social studies, science or related academic courses suited to the child's age and ability, and at least 400 of those 600 must take place at the regular home school location.
Records: keep (a) a plan book, diary or other written record of subjects taught and activities, (b) a portfolio of samples of your child's academic work, and (c) a record of evaluations of your child's progress — or other written or credible evidence equivalent to those three.
Age 16 and up: the hours and records requirements don't apply to a pupil 16 or older (RSMo 167.012(3)). Most families keep records through high school anyway, because you'll need them to write a transcript.
Your defense if questioned: a daily log showing a course of instruction that meets the law is a defense to a truancy prosecution or an educational neglect charge (RSMo 167.012(4)). Home school enforcement and records may be reviewed only by the local prosecuting attorney.
If a report comes in: if a Children's Division investigation finds that the only issue is compulsory attendance, the division sends the report to your school district, which must refer home school matters to the county prosecuting attorney (RSMo 210.167). A juvenile officer looking into a home school attendance question must first contact the parent to verify the child is being taught at home before reporting a violation (RSMo 211.031). Violating the attendance law is a class C misdemeanor (RSMo 167.061).
Withdrawing from school: give the school a written notice that you intend to pursue another educational option under RSMo 167.031 and ask that your child be dropped from the district's rolls. The school must comply and remove your child promptly (RSMo 167.042, effective August 28, 2025). The former optional "declaration of enrollment" filed with the county recorder of deeds or the district was removed from that section by SB 63 (2025).
Transcripts: DESE keeps no individual student records, so your own records are the basis for your child's transcript. Ozarks Technical Community College, for example, asks homeschool graduates for a completed high school transcript listing courses and letter grades, and doesn't require the HiSET or GED for admission.
Group classes and co-ops: a home school may enroll no more than four children who are unrelated to each other, and at least 400 of the 600 core hours must take place at your regular home school location, so plan outside classes with both limits in mind.

Read the full section in our Missouri guide

Official sources

Summarized from our Missouri guide (as of October 2026) and articles. Rules change — confirm on the official pages before you act.

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