Homeschool Transcripts

Copyright by Deb Erbach Burger - Used with permission

Do you need information on designing homeschool transcripts? If your child is earning his high school diploma at home and plans to attend college, you'll want to read this!

It’s important to have a transcript that clearly presents only the necessary and relevant information about academic preparation, and a portfolio highlighting the student’s life experiences and learning outside textbooks.

The most common error made by parents constructing homeschool transcripts is that they are too long, and contains too much information. In the business world, the rule of thumb of thumb about resumes is, “No one EVER reads past the second page. Period.” So, no matter how wide your experience, there’s one page for the cover letter and one page for the actual resume. Period. After that, it’s pure waste of paper. The same is true of a high school transcript.

The admissions counselors at universities are very busy people, with mountains of paperwork to wade through each week. A transcript that clearly gives them JUST the information they need, that doesn’t require hunting through extraneous facts to find what’s needed… this is a transcript that will get attention, and find its way to the top of the “inbox” instead of the bottom of the pile to be wrestled with later!

The first page of a homeschool transcript, corresponding to the cover letter of a resume, should clearly provide the name and address of the school, and the name and title of its administrator.

There should be an explanation of the grading standard used by the school, and if different from the standard of 150 hrs. per credit, an explanation of how credits have been assigned. These explanations should be in separate text boxes, for clarity.

It should also provide identifying information about the student—full name, date of birth, date of (expected or completed) graduation, GPA, and SAT or ACT and SAT II scores. These scores will also fit neatly into a text box.

Many colleges require a student’s Social Security Number, and because there are tax credits involved and tax forms to be sent to the student and/or parent, they have a legal right to ask for this information before enrolling your student. You can choose whether to include it on the high school transcript or not… but remember, you’re trying to make it EASY to find all the necessary information about this student, not hard, and the admissions people are required by law to treat the information as confidential.

Remember, too, that lots of “white space” on a form makes it easier to locate information! Also use a clear simple font in an easily readable size.

The second page is the actual transcript, and should present the following information: Course titles, with corresponding final grades and credit awarded, for each academic area. That’s all.

It is totally irrelevant which credits were earned in which year, and this is NOT the place for elaborate class descriptions, lists of textbooks, or paragraphs about various experiences.

The title of each course should be brief and descriptive. For instance “English 11” tells the college NOTHING about what was actually studied! “American Literature Survey with Composition,” on the other hand, tells the reader much about the content of the course.

“Social Studies” is an academic area, not a course title. The field of Social Studies includes History (American, European, World, Ancient, Modern, etc.), Geography (Physical, Cultural), Political Science, Economics, and Sociology; so title the course to describe which of the Social Studies it actually is!

Lab Sciences should have a notation indicating that a body of actual laboratory experience is included, sometimes by awarding a separate grade and separate credit for Biology and Biology Lab.

The course title can include either a word or a symbol denoting the academic level of the class—is it Advanced, Academic, Remedial?

If you, like many homeschooling parents, are awarding high school credit for classes that were taken at a college (who will also award their own college credit on their own transcript, for that course), you should include a symbol or notation to the effect that this course represents college work. Clearly, descriptive course titles will, in many cases, eliminate the need for separate Course Descriptions, so the time spent in creating clear titles is a real time saver in the long run.

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