Virginia marks jump in homeschooling numbers for families ‘meeting the child where they are’ 

Danette Sajous is using her background in entrepreneurship and finance to teach homeschool co-op elementary students how to cook and cultivate life skills.

“My kids are extremely social,” the Virginia mom told the local ABC affiliate. “And then once we joined the co-op, even more so, because they’re around other students who are also being homeschooled.”

The Sajous family is one of a growing number of households choosing to homeschool – a trend playing out nationally as well as statewide.

“At least 50,000 children have been homeschooled each year since the pandemic, which sparked a peak during the 2020-2021 school year when 59,638 Virginia children were educated at home,” the news outlet explained. “The 2025-26 school year recorded numbers nearing pandemic levels with 59,055 homeschooled children, a 5.34% increase from the 2024-25 school year and roughly a 16% jump from 2022-23.”

Homeschooling ‘helps their children thrive’ 

Patricia Beahr, the Home Educators Association of Virginia (HEAV) director of government relations, credited the COVID-19 pandemic with helping parents learn more about this growing educational option.

“Home education works, and it helps their children thrive,” she said. “(The pandemic) changed their paradigm on what education is and what education can be.”

Beahr has homeschooled her two daughters since 2013. Instead of trying to fit students into preconceived age or grade levels, parents can use homeschooling to customize learning directly to each student, she said.

“You are meeting the child where they are, and then you’re teaching based on that position.”

For families concerned about affordability, homeschooling doesn’t have to be expensive. “We’ve never spent more than $600 a year because we had access to so many resources – free, very low-cost,” she says.

As for socialization, Beahr described the range of homeschooling demographics as another proof of the various communities benefiting from this lifestyle.

“Homeschooling communities are diverse, with the growing population of Black, Hispanic and special-needs families,” the ABC affiliate noted. “These communities engage in sports, clubs, volunteer work and other community programs, allowing homeschooled children to develop their social and cultural skills through real-world experiences outside of a traditional classroom.”

Homeschooled children also tend to outpace their peers academically. They ranked between the 81st and 87th percentile in language, math, science, social studies and reading in a 2022 HEAV study – surpassing the national 50th percentile average, Beahr noted.

“Research on homeschool academics goes back nearly 50 years and across multiple studies. … So the academic achievement, the numbers are there for that.”

Beahr believes homeschooling will continue as “part of Virginia’s education landscape” for the foreseeable future.

“One thing that parents need to know is that homeschool kids are just like any other kids. They play, they socialize, they make friends while learning in ways that best fit them.”