Home-schooled students with disabilities are permitted under State law to access special education services from the local public school when selected to receive special education services as part of a pool of potentially eligible private and home-schooled students. Consequently, if such students are enrolled to receive such services from the local public school, the students must be coded into the Arkansas Public School Computer Network (APSCN) system using the entry code of HS.
Home-schooled students, including those with disabilities, are not to be included in the student population to be assessed on the statewide Benchmark Exams or the alternate portfolio assessment. It is important to ensure that home-schooled students are not included in the enrollment figures of the local district to be counted as students expected to participate in these assessments, as well as, for purposes of adequate yearly progress (AYP) calculation.
All home-schooled students receiving services from a public school should be coded with the Entry Code of HS in the APSCN system. Calculations of enrollment for determining student participation rates and for AYP purposes will exclude all students properly coded as HS, preventing inflated enrollment figures of students expected to participate in these statewide mandated assessments.
Please direct any questions to Tom Hicks in the Special Education Unit of the Arkansas Department of Education at 501-682-4221 or via e-mail at thicks@arkedu.k12.ar.us .