Religious Education Time and Homeschool Transcripts

This afternoon I was setting up the format for my son’s high school transcript. We live in a state that doesn’t require record-keeping or reporting. We only need to “provide instruction the same number of days as the local public school” with no actual definition as to attendance; so we’ve always just done our own thing for tracking – some years that means nothing in particular other than finishing a resource. We don’t even have set start/end dates, though I basically utilized the liturgical year as our guide for grade level.

As I set up the transcript, I put theology first. It is the most important and I want it counted as a separate subject, even separate from “electives”.

Indeed our faith is key to our entire lifestyle.

The first item I entered was my son’s attendance at the local parish’s religious education program this coming semester.

Legoboy in the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd atrium
Age: almost 2

Background TMI: He didn’t enroll in 7^th grade because the curriculum used and the ensuing discussion would have been a waste of his time – redundant for a child coming out of 11 years in the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd atrium – he started at age 1! Also there are serious legitimate concerns regarding the teacher for the class he would have been in. Not for the children’s safety or theological teaching, but for personality conflicts and a negative attitude about the atrium. This year, the whole 7^th-9^th grade program has been revamped – and I LOVE IT! It more fully supports children coming out of several years in the atrium as well as honors their natural faith interests at this age. We didn’t do first semester because of personal issues going on – we didn’t know if he could commit. And I am strong on commitment. Fortunately the resource used is one we have already done as part of our homeschool CGS atrium for the oldest children (Altaration). He isn't missing out on much - though I would have liked him to have further exploration and discussion on this program. 

He is enrolling for second semester, because while our family issues continue, we have arrangements for his steady attendance regardless of outcomes. They are utilizing the new YOU program – the updated version of Theology of the Body for high schoolers. I was able to preview the videos online and see the textbook and teacher manual. LOVE IT! I had reservations for homeschoolers on the original TOB for high school, but the YOU is appropriate.

Ok great. Let’s add it to his transcript. Typed in the title of the class, the name of the resource, go to total up the hours. OH. Ok. Hmm.

I’m not sure how many homeschoolers have actually thought this through on a practical level, but have merely responded to it intuitively.


Our local religious ed program is 28 sessions for 1 ½ hour each time. 42 hours of instruction time for the entire school year. Most other parishes in the general vicinity are 45-60 minutes each class, maybe meeting 20-25 sessions. Our local archdiocese would like to see a minimum of 30 hours of instruction time, over the course of an entire school year.

Let’s look at the transcript. To record a credit for a full year, 180 hours of instruction time must be achieved. Public schools have some room for padding this – 48-53 minute classes can count for 1 instruction hour at our local public high school. In a 180 day school year, children can have a certain number of excused and unexcused absences, thus reducing the number of attended hours; as well as school events, fire drills, and other occurrences that cut into this time. Homeschoolers tend to go for recording actual instruction time for the entire 180 hours needed. We are already outside the norm, we don’t usually want to invite any questions on how well we are following the law.

180 hours for an entire year. This is 90 instruction hours for a one semester course. 45 instruction hour for a quarter-year course.

Even our generous local parish does not provide a full 45 hours of instruction time through the entire school year. Not even enough to count for a quarter-year course on a transcript, if using the full clock hour definition.

This is why many homeschoolers intuitively don’t see the value of the parish religious ed program. Because the pastors and the DREs are saying “we are providing less than a quarter-year course of instruction on the faith.”

I understand we parents are fully responsible for our children’s faith formation and that the parish is supposed to be an assist to that noble undertaking. By offering so few hours of instruction (setting aside teacher quality, curriculum quality, scheduling issues, how much we study the faith at home already, setting all that aside! And focusing on the number of hours provided), the parish religious ed program is saying of itself “we don’t value religious instruction enough to provide even the public school equivalent of a quarter-year course.”

At 42 hours, our local parish provides more actual instruction hours than our local public schools do for a quarter length course, considering their usual classes are 51 minutes long but get to count for a full “hour.”

This still leaves me wondering – a quarter-year course on something that is so foundational to our very being.

And it leaves me understanding why those same homeschoolers who say no to the regular religious ed program leap at the opportunity for a 2-hour weekly atrium that meets 30 sessions – providing 60 hours of actual instruction time which is only 16 ½ hours short of a full semester course. These families see something of value – value for their time, their children’s intelligence, their family’s faith formation.

	Official Definition	Public school: don’t usually finish the book; absentee time still counted as instruction time (up to a point)	Homeschool: finish the textbook, add in supplements to fill the time; absentee time not counted as instruction
1 year course	180 hours	51 minutes = 153 instruction hours;	180+ hours
½ year course Semester	90 hours	51 minute classes = 76.5 hours	90+ hours
¼ year course Quarter	45 hours	51 minutes = 38.25 hours	45+ hours

The chart as an image:

A re-formatted version of this post as an explanation to pastors and DREs:
Religious Education Hours - Letter to Pastors and DREs