Texas Homeschooling: You Probably Do Not File a Notice of Intent

The first Texas parent who emailed us this month had a Google Doc titled "NOTICE OF INTENT" and a list of counties she thought she had to post it to. She had spent three evenings on it. I had to tell her to close the file.

Texas does not run a statewide homeschool registration. The Texas Education Agency has said for years that a homeschool is a type of private school. You are not asking a district for permission. You are not mailing Austin a form so a clerk can stamp your kitchen table.

That is the bit most national "how to start homeschooling" articles get wrong, because they copy-paste a 50-state chart and write "file a notice of intent" next to Texas. Some states do want that letter. Texas is not one of them.

What the Leeper case actually settled

If you have been around homeschool groups for five minutes you have heard "Leeper." In the 1990s, Texas courts confirmed that homeschool families operating a bona fide curriculum are private schools, not truants. The practical test that stuck is boring, which is why it works:

• You are teaching reading, spelling, grammar, mathematics and good citizenship.
• You are using some form of written curriculum, not a vague promise to "learn from life" with nothing on paper.
• Instruction is taking place.

That is it. There is no annual test the state of Texas requires of homeschoolers. There is no portfolio you mail to the TEA.

What we still keep anyway

Legal minimum and "can I prove this if a well-meaning relative calls the district" are different piles of paper. We tell Texas Fayferz families to keep four things in a folder, even though nobody in Austin is asking:

1. A one-page scope for the year. Maths and English first. The rest can be a list.
2. A dated attendance log. A tick-box is fine. "We did school on Tuesday" is the whole point.
3. Work samples. One maths page and one piece of writing a month is enough.
4. A simple record of the curriculum you are using, including any Oxford-aligned track or other programme.

If a district attendance officer ever knocks, you want to look organised, not defiant. Organised is a folder. Defiant is a Facebook screenshot.

The unschooling edge case

Texas parents who genuinely unschool worry this "written curriculum" language. In practice, families who can show a plan, even a loose one, and evidence of instruction, are in a different category from families who cannot describe a typical Tuesday. If your child is six and you are using a phonics sequence and a maths book, you are not in the grey zone. If you have been "waiting to see what they are interested in" since August and it is now November, you are.

How this fits a Fayferz week

A Texas Grade 1 day on Fayferz is not a full school timetable. It is a maths lesson, a phonics or reading lesson, and a short quiz that marks itself. The attendance log is the date the lesson was completed. That is the paper trail without the theatre of a notice of intent that nobody will file.

If you are not in Texas, start with the country guide instead. The rules change at the border, and they change hard.