RALEIGH, N.C. — While Amanda Harris’s husband is an Army veteran, she can be considered a veteran homeschooling mother.

In 2013, her family moved to North Carolina from Germany. While living in Pinehurst, Harris opted to put her children into homeschool.

What You Need To Know

  • Wake County has the largest number of registered homeschools and homeschooled students in the state

  • The number of registered homeschools in North Carolina for the 2020-2021 school year is up more than 20% than the 2019-2020 school year

  • Amanda Harris opened her homeschool seven years ago

“I felt like I didn’t have a piece in their learning, and I wanted to be able to see what they were learning and as frustrating and hard as it is to teach a child how to read, it’s extremely rewarding when it finally starts to click and you’re like yes, I did that,” Harris said.

The mother of four boys has a bachelor’s degree in early childhood education and a master’s degree in exercise science. In April 2020, her family moved from Pinehurst to Raleigh.

“One of the nice things about homeschooling is it allows you to move at the pace of your child, and I found that the boys, my boys are typically more hands on,” Harris said.

This year, two of her sons graduated from the homeschooling program and began the sixth and eighth grade at a Catholic school in Wake County. Her youngest son is in preschool, which leaves her second grader, Matthew, the only student on her roster this year.

“Now, with just second grade, we can get through the work pretty quickly. It’s a very joyful homeschooling experience,” Harris said.

Harris says it also allows more flexibility in their schedule.

Since moving to Raleigh in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, Harris says the Facebook group Homeschool Moms around Wake County has been a resource for her sons to meet other kids their age that are also in homeschooling programs. Through the group, she meets with other mother’s doing co-op programs around the Triangle.

“One of the positives moving during the pandemic is everyone is home and that time in April it was just shy of were going to be doing this for two weeks and there were a lot of kids out and the boys immediately made friends in the neighborhood, everyone was outside and that helped tremendously,” Harris said.

Her boys also play hockey for the Junior Hurricanes which allows them to have that socialization with other kids their age.

Since 2019-2020 school year, North Carolina has seen a more than 20% increase in families registering for homeschool. For the 2020-2021 school year, Wake County reported the largest number of registered homeschools and homeschooled students.

“It doesn’t hurt to try and take it one year at a time, I would reach out to other homeschooler families, you can even join the Facebook group and ask questions if you are interested,” Harris said.