| Is it possible for a homeschool to provide high school | | | | We did all our work in all our sciences at home by |
| science that will be acceptable to the colleges? My | | | | ourselves. To be honest, I don't know a thing about |
| boys had biology, chemistry and physics at home, all | | | | physics, so my kids were completely on their own with |
| with science labs, without any outside help from | | | | that one (with some help from a video tutorial.) I just |
| schools or co-ops. Not only did the colleges accept our | | | | graded tests and looked at the lab write ups. (If the lab |
| science records, they also offered us great | | | | write up made sense to me, they got 100% - if it didn't |
| scholarships, including two full-tuition scholarships at my | | | | make sense to me, they got something less.) Although |
| son's first choice university! | | | | I do understand biology and chemistry, they did most |
| In our homeschool, we had "Biology with Lab" on the | | | | of that work on their own as well. |
| transcript. I gave course descriptions for colleges. The | | | | Many (even most) colleges will accept lab sciences |
| course description was a paragraph long, and | | | | done at home. There are some exceptions, however. |
| described how we taught biology. Much of the | | | | For example, the University of Washington wants |
| information I got from the catalog description of the | | | | "proof" of science. That's why they prefer the ACT |
| textbook we used. I wrote a list of the labs that we | | | | test. The ACT covers more than reading, writing and |
| did, using the list from the book's table of contents. I | | | | math. It covers science as well. They accept the ACT |
| demonstrated my grading criteria, carefully showing | | | | test as "proof." They also accept SAT 2, AP, and |
| every chapter grade, and a grade for every lab | | | | community college lab sciences as "proof." But the |
| write-up my children completed. A good lab write up | | | | University of Washington is in the minority, because |
| got 100%, but some of them "weren't so good." That | | | | most colleges don't have additional requirements. The |
| gave the colleges a thorough explanation of exactly | | | | UW policies have also changed a lot over time. If your |
| what our transcript meant when it said "Biology with | | | | child is interested in ANY college, it's a good idea to |
| Lab." I saved all the tests and all the lab write-ups, in | | | | check their policies every year, because they can |
| case a college would ask for a sample of their work | | | | change dramatically. |
| (some did!). | | | | |