I was looking at another blog about home schooling where the author basically asked the question, "can I just use high school home schooling time to send my child to a community college to get an associates degree?" (
http://sporschool.blogspot.com/2010/06/homeschooling-question-high-school.html) I started thinking about it and decided: why not skip high school?
I've heard chatter here in Utah about if you get your associates degree while in high school (concurrent enrollment, AP tests, etc) then there are special grants to pay for the rest of a bachelors. So why not approach it the other way and get the associates and just apply those credits to a high school diploma while you're at it? I know there are non-traditional ways to get a high school diploma by getting credits from other sources (GED, night school, etc). For example, a GED isn't a high school diploma, but it can count as so many credits applied to a high school diploma. One of my classes was in High School was taught by someone with a Masters, and we were able to sign up to get college credit for that class (concurrent enrollment). I know it was also possible to take classes at the local community college and have them applied towards the High School diploma.
I did a quick check for the colleges I went to to see about getting in without a high school diploma. Salt Lake Community College (SLCC) says "SLCC is an 'open admission' institution, which means there are no minimum grades and test scores required for admission." (
http://www.slcc.edu/enrollmentservices/misc/ApplyAdmissions.asp) Basically you show up, pay a little to take their computer test (math and English skills) and that tells you what level of math and English you start at (SAT and ACT scores apply if they were taken within 2 years of enrollment.) As a side note, I took that test because I started there more than 2 years after high school. I was place in English 101 and Trigonometry. I still think I could have started at Calculus there, but the highest math class their test will place you in is trigonometry.
Utah State University actually has an admissions page for homeschool students:
http://www.usu.edu/admissions/homeschool/apply.cfm. You have to have an ACT or SAT score and you have to have a GPA of at least 2.5, but I have no idea how a homeschool student gets a GPA.
So it would seem that it is possible to skip high school and go straight for the Associates degree depending on what college the child goes to and that schools requirements. The questions remain though: at what age can a child be prepared to take English 101, trig, and other classes when you home school them? (This really depends on the home schooling parent) If the child places in lower classes is it worth it to pay college tuition to take those lower classes? Are you close enough to a community college to send a young child there every day (or else how will the child live somewhere outside of home to take classes)? And of course what are the social/phycological challenges of a 15 year old in classes with adults? On the other hand, I had classmates in college that were homeschooled and they did say they felt like the first college classes were easier than they were used to.
