Documenting Homeschool Academic Records

Should you include documentation of your students academic record by year or by subject on your transcript? Do colleges prefer to see the classes by subject organization: english, math, history etc. or do they prefer to know which year your student completed what subject: Freshman, sophomore, junior etc.?

The trouble with these questions is that there isn’t a one size fits all answer.

I decided to put both on my sons transcripts. The reason why is because some colleges will want it one way and other colleges will want it the other way – it was really hard for me to figure out which one wanted which. I kept both prepared at all times and both of those were part of my comprehensive records tied to my course descriptions. I would then find out which way colleges preferred it and give them the corresponding academic record.

I would give it to them that way; lay the transcript that they wanted on the top and underneath that would be the spiral-bound copy of my comprehensive homeschool records which had both. That way, I felt that I was making it  as easy as possible for them.

Colleges have good reason for wanting the transcript each way. Sometimes they want to know by subject whether you actually had four years of English and four years of math. Other colleges will want the transcript by year because they really want to know whether the child fell apart in senior year and had senioritis. They can compare year to year and see which one looks beefier.

They have their own reasons and you don’t really know so you want to find out of their preferred way of getting the transcript and give it to them that way. Yet at the same time, I included both in the comprehensive record underneath that one page.