Homeschool Requirements in Maryland: Choosing Who Supervises

Maryland asks you to make one decision before anything else: who supervises your program. Either the local school system does, in which case you notify them 15 days before you start and agree to as many as three portfolio reviews a year, or a nonpublic school or bona fide church organization does, in which case the local school system does not review your portfolio at all. Everything else in Maryland homeschool law follows from that fork.

There is no testing requirement in either track. Maryland’s oversight is a conversation about a folder of work, not a percentile.

Checked against COMAR 13A.10.01.01 to .05 and Maryland State Department of Education home instruction guidance as at 21 August 2026. Notification is on a form prescribed by MSDE and filed with your local superintendent.

Maryland at a glance

The fork: who supervises

This is the decision that shapes your year, and plenty of Maryland families make it by accident rather than on purpose.

Track one: local school system supervision

You file the MSDE notification form with your local superintendent, and you agree to permit a representative of the local school system to review the portfolio of educational materials and to discuss the instructional program. There may be no more than three reviews in a school year, and each must be at a mutually agreeable time and place.

Read both of those limits carefully, because they are protections rather than obligations. Three is a ceiling, not a schedule, and most systems do two. “Mutually agreeable place” means the review does not have to happen in your home, and in practice many are held at a district office, a library or online.

Track two: nonpublic school or church organization supervision

A home instruction program may instead be supervised by a nonpublic school that holds a certificate of approval from MSDE, or by a school operated by a bona fide church organization. Under this option, the local school system does not conduct the portfolio review.

What the supervising institution does instead depends on which kind it is:

• A church-operated program holds a pre-enrollment conference with the parent, provides textbooks and instructional materials for independent use, and holds conferences with the family at appropriate intervals.
• An approved nonpublic school supplies instructional materials for home-based learning and assigns a school-based teacher to support the home instructor, grade work and provide progress reports.

Both must annually verify the student’s enrollment status with the local superintendent and notify them of new enrollments or changes in status.

How to choose. The umbrella route trades a public reviewer for a private one, and the private one is often more involved rather than less: an approved nonpublic school assigns a teacher who grades work. It suits families who want curricular support, a religious framework, or a supervisor whose expectations they already know. Local school system supervision suits families who want to be left alone between two scheduled conversations and who would rather not pay an umbrella fee. Neither is the lighter option in the abstract, and the honest way to pick is to ask the umbrella school what it will actually require of you and compare that with two portfolio reviews.

Notification, and the 15 days

File the statement on the MSDE-prescribed form with your local superintendent at least 15 days before the home instruction program begins, then verify annually thereafter. You also agree to notify the superintendent of any change of status during the school year.

The 15 days is the detail to plan around when withdrawing mid-year. Unlike Ohio’s five days after starting or Oregon’s ten days after withdrawing, Maryland’s clock runs before you begin. A parent who pulls a child out on Monday and files on Tuesday has the sequence backwards.

The eight subject areas

English, mathematics, science, social studies, art, music, health, and physical education.

Art and music are named separately here, as they are in Pennsylvania and Vermont, and are the two most commonly under-documented subjects in any portfolio. If your child draws, sings, plays an instrument or visits a gallery, that is coverage. Photograph it and date it.

There is no hour count and no day count. The standard is that instruction be regular and thorough, provided on a regular basis, and of sufficient duration to implement the instruction program. That is deliberately qualitative, and it is what the portfolio review is assessing.

The portfolio: what actually goes in it

The regulation names the contents, so build to the list rather than to your anxiety:

• instructional materials,
• reading materials,
• examples of the child’s writings, worksheets, workbooks, creative materials and tests.

Two practical notes that make reviews go well. Date everything, because “regular” and “on a regular basis” are claims about distribution over time, and an undated stack cannot demonstrate them however good the work is. And organize by subject, all eight of them, so a reviewer can find coverage rather than hunting for it. A thin folder that is dated and sorted reads better than a thick one that is neither.

Note also what is absent from the list: no lesson plans, no attendance register, no hours log, no test scores. Maryland asks to see the child’s work.

If the program is found deficient

Maryland sets out the process precisely, and it is short:

1. The local superintendent notifies you in writing of any deficiencies in the program.
2. You have 30 days from receiving that notice to provide evidence that the deficiency has been or is being corrected.
3. If the superintendent determines there is no satisfactory correction plan, or the deficiency remains uncorrected, the child shall be enrolled promptly in a public or nonpublic school.

Two things about that middle step are worth holding onto. The standard is “has been or is being corrected”, so a credible plan in progress satisfies it, and the deficiencies must be stated in writing, which means you are responding to something specific rather than to a general impression.

Maryland is nevertheless one of only two states in this series, alongside Oregon, where the endpoint is compelled enrollment. The difference is the timeline: Oregon’s ladder runs over years of test results, Maryland’s over 30 days from a written notice. Do not let a notice sit.

Two provisions worth knowing

Public school testing is available on request. A home-instructed child may, at the parent’s request, take part in the regularly scheduled standardized testing programs administered at the public school the child is eligible to attend. Testing is not required in Maryland, but if you want an external benchmark, you can have one.

Returning to school is an evaluation, not an automatic grade placement. On application for admission to a public school, the local superintendent determines the child’s placement, and any credits toward high school graduation, by evaluation. That is the strongest practical argument for keeping the portfolio after the review is over: it becomes the evidence behind a placement decision.

Records and evidence: what to keep

1. The portfolio, dated and sorted by subject, all eight areas. This is the document Maryland actually looks at.
2. Your notification and each annual verification, with proof of filing dates.
3. A note of each review: when it happened, who attended, what was said. Useful if a later reviewer takes a different view.
4. Any written notice of deficiency and your response, given the 30 day clock.
5. Prior years’ portfolios, because re-entry placement and high school credit are decided by evaluation.

The portfolio is a coverage argument across eight subjects, so materials that state which standard they cover make the sorting step disappear and make art and music countable rather than forgotten. Sprout Lessons builds standards-aligned lessons for grades K–12. Try it free.

How Maryland compares

Maryland and Pennsylvania both build their systems around a portfolio, and then send it to opposite places. Pennsylvania’s goes to a private evaluator you choose and pay, and the district never sees it. Maryland’s is shown directly to the local school system, unless you take the umbrella route, in which case it goes to a private supervisor instead. If you like the Pennsylvania model but live in Maryland, the umbrella track is the closest equivalent.

Compare the rest: Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Ohio, Washington, Oregon, New York and Massachusetts. For what to teach, start with homeschool curriculum in the USA. If a review raises a gap, catching up after falling behind and helping with math at home without a tutor are the follow-through, and interests as a gateway to the curriculum is how the art and music coverage happens without being a separate project.

The honest summary

Decide the supervision question deliberately, then build one folder. File 15 days before you start, not after. Keep dated work in all eight subjects, art and music included, sorted so a reviewer can see coverage in ten minutes. Treat the three-review ceiling as a ceiling.

And if a written notice of deficiency ever arrives, answer it inside 30 days with evidence that the gap is being closed, because “is being corrected” is enough and silence is not.

Sprout Lessons builds standards-aligned lessons for grades K–12, so the portfolio grows as you teach instead of the week before a review. Start free.

This guide summarizes COMAR 13A.10.01.01 to .05 and Maryland State Department of Education guidance as at 21 August 2026. It is general information, not legal advice. Home instruction is administered by your local school system, and umbrella arrangements vary by institution: confirm current requirements with your local superintendent or at marylandpublicschools.org before you file.

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