First the Army, then the Navy

Well, given the date of the manual, 03/11/02, I guess it was first the Navy, then the Army.

Gotta love the last sentence from PDF page 83 of the Navy Recruiting Manual.

• g. Home School Diploma.  Conference Report (Section 571) of the FY 99 National Defense Authorization Act established a five-year pilot program to permit home school diploma recipients TIER 1 high school diploma graduate status.  A home school is a 12-year curriculum based, instruction oriented academic experience, in the home, involving regular parental or guardian instruction and education.  Attendance should be for at least an average of 4.5 hours daily and at least 170 days per academic/grade year.  For applicable state laws governing home school see http://www.hslda.org/central/states/xx/laws.html. The xx is the state abbreviation.

For those who are interested, links to the laws, and not just summations of the laws, can be found at Ann Zeise's site (click on the first letter of your state's name to find state-specific information), as well as information for you to learn what you need to know about standing up for yourself. Another site with links to state pages is the National Home Education Network.

HSLDA does not provide legal 'insurance,' (scroll down at the linked site, but read what Kay has written as well) only membership in a homeschooling advocacy organization.  HSLDA also involves itself in activities beyond the scope of homeschooling itself, such as trying to get national legislation affecting homeschoolers written into the National Defense Authorization Act.  This may, or may not, appeal to potential members.  More information is available at Homeschooing Is Legal.

A combination that might be useful for new homeschoolers is to join a state-specific online group and ask veteran homeschoolers about how best to get along in that particular state.  For specifically-legal concerns, an actual pre-paid legal insurance plan would probably work best (no, I haven't used this particular plan; my husband's company provides this kind of plan).  If a specifically-homeschooling plan is desired, try the National Home Education Legal Defense (NHELD).