Community/Local College. In recent years, homeschoolingrnfamilies have found that two plus two costs less than four. Attendingrna community college for two years enables their 16-rnyear-old student to live at home, saves them lots of money, givesrnthe student practice in going to college, and results in creditsrnthat can be transferred to a more prestigious institution. Therndownside is that these are usually not two years of educationalrnchallenge. However, if parents start their high-school studentrnon some community-college courses, usually they can makernthe course count twice for credit. In the excellent book GiftedrnChildren at Home, coauthor Kathleen Julicher relates the storyrnof enrolling her 12-year-old, Seth, in a local university’s mathrnclass. He not only ended up with the top grade in the class, butrnhe was invited to assist in teaching the class. By the time herngraduated high school, he had already amassed two years of collegerncredit.rnTesting Out. The increased emphasis on educational excellencernin general, and classical education in particular, sweepingrnthe homeschool movement has caused an upsurge of interestrnin Advanced Placement (A.P.) courses. The vast majority- ofrncolleges and universities grant credit for high marks on any ofrnthe 29 A.P. exams. Recently, the College Board has begun advertisingrnits College Level Exam Program (CLEP) in homeschoolrnmagazines. Over 2,800 institutions grant college creditrnfor acceptable scores on any of the 34 CLEP exams. The RegentsrnCollege Examination Program has also shown interest inrngetting more homeschoolers to take its tests, which are acceptedrnfor college credit by over 1,000 colleges and universities.rnIt is possible to get one year or more of college credit throughrnA.P., CLEP, and Regents exams. Pennsylvania Homeschoolersrn{www.pahomeschoolers.com) and Scholars Online Academyrn{www.islas.org) offer excellent online A.P. courses to homeschoolers.rnIf a student qualifies as “gifted” through any of the regionalrnTalent Search programs, sofhvare-based A.P. courses arernavailable from Stanford University’s Educational Program forrnGifted Youth. Some of the Talent Search programs also offerrnintensive on-site three-week summer A.P. courses. And PaulrnAllen, the cofounder of Microsoft, has put some serious moneyrninto an online academy called Apex {www.apex.netu.com),rnwhose mission is to offer A.P. courses nationwide. Apex originallyrnwas set up to supplement local high-school course offerings,rnsince most schools offer either no or only a few A.P. courses.rnAs of fall 2000, ten courses are available at $395 perrnsemester. If Apex plays its cards right, homeschoolers should bernamong its best customers.rnAt present, homeschoolers can take high-school correspondencerncourses from a variety of state colleges, such as Universitvrnof Nebraska-Lincoln, Texas Tech, University of Wisconsin,rnand Indiana State University. I have been talking to thernpeople who run these programs for years, urging them to add arncomplete lineup of A.P. courses to their curricula. They mayrndo so soon, perhaps in time to compete with Apex before it becomesrnthe Microsoft of A.P. training.rnI should mention one thing: A.P.’s are not like the SATs orrnACT, which you can sign up for yourself You have to enrollrnthrough a local high school, and the school is under no legalrnobligation to offer the exams you need. We initially had troublernwith our local high school, which was willing to let our childrenrntake A.P. exams for the courses that it taught (even though theyrnhad not attended the course) but did not want to let them signrnup for A.P. exams in subjects the high school did not offer. Thernprivate schools in our area that offer A.P. exams also declined.rnA friendly state legislator had to talk to the school superintendentrnon our behalf before our kids could take the A.P. Microeconomicsrnand A.P. Computer Science exams. All the schoolrnhas to do is send in the sign-up sheet with a check, provide arnproctor, and mail in the tests. Since they are the only ones whorncan do this, it seems only fair that anyone in the local communityrnshould be able to avail himself of these tests, not just the studentsrnwho attend the school and take a particular course.rnThere is, however, one downside of “testing ouf of a year orrnmore of college: Most scholarships are reserved for enteringrnfreshmen. If your child enters as a sophomore, he could missrnout on some lucrative scholarships. It is wise to check the policiesrnof the institution he hopes to attend before digging intornmore than three or four A.P. courses. The College Board itselfrnrecommends, “Unless told to do so, do not send your CLEPrnscores until you have been officially admitted.”rnCollege at Home. Even better than the increased availabilityrnof A.P. and other college-credit exams would be the increasedrnavailability of college at home. Most colleges realize this,rnwhich is why just about every one is working toward making atrnleast some of its curriculum available through distance learning.rnWitness the bulk of the latest guides to distance learning,rncompared to the slender editions available only a few years ago.rnWhat is not yet available—and is desperately needed —is arntwo-year liberal-arts curriculum designed for homeschooledrnstudents. Patrick Henry College, a project initiated by thernHomeschool Legal Defense Association, looks like the first steprntoward a campus-based version of what we need in distance education.rnPatrick Henry College can only accommodate 200rnstudents, will offer initially only one major (government), and isrnnot even considering any distance-education component untilrnit has received accreditation, which will take years. However,rnthe founders of the college have the right idea academically.rnThey realize that the average homeschool graduate is already arnvoracious reader with a wide background in literature and history;rnan eager learner; a logical thinker who is aware of differingrnworldviews; and a believer in God and traditional moral values.rnThus, freshman college courses for this group might resemblerngraduate courses in their depth of discussion. Hands-on andrnreal-world practice is appreciated by homeschoolers, and thernPatrick Henry College program is designed to include much ofrnthis. (See www.phc.edu for details.)rnThe ideal distance-education college program for homeschoolersrnwould combine hands-on projects and Great Booksrnstudies, of the kind popularized in America by St. John’s College.rnFollow this with a year of traveling in Europe or workingrnin various jobs, and a student would be well prepared for the finalrntwo years of college, in which vocational (or at least majorrelated)rnstudies predominate.rnI predict that the first accredited, non-politically impairedrncollege or university that comes up with a classical distance-educationrnprogram such as the one I have described will make arnmint from homeschoolers, as long as it is priced affordably.rnHigh-school online courses are settling into the range of $200 torn$395 per semester. Even at quadruple that amount, college atrnhome would be a bargain, and both the professors and the administratorsrncould live on the revenues. With hundreds ofrnthousands of homeschooled students now in their high-schoolrnyears, I see no reason why a number of competing institutionsrnshould not end up with thousands of off-campus studentsrnapiece, just from the homeschool community. crnSEPTEMBER 2000/1 7rnrnrn