Colorado K-12 online home school. Accredited. Year-round.
An accredited private school for Colorado families who want K-12 done at home. Self-paced study from kindergarten through twelfth grade. A diploma the receiving school can read without translation.
K through 12
Self-paced, year-round
Built for Colorado
The counselors answer the phone.
USDOE-recognized
Every grade band
Mid-year welcome
Every region served
2.0The category
What this actually is
We don’t have the football field. We have everything else.
The teachers are on payroll. The curriculum is ours. The credits are ours to award. The diploma is ours to issue. The transcript carries the school’s name on it, on the same kind of letterhead the registrar at CU Boulder reads from any other private school in the state. The GPA reads the same. The AP designations read the same. The FAFSA office processes the file the same. The difference is the building.
“Online home school” gets stretched across a lot of things in Colorado, and most of them aren’t this. This is the actual category, with the actual paperwork: an accredited K-12 online private school, 501(c)(3), board-governed, audited annually, findable in the accreditor’s public registry. Ask any school for that registry entry. Trust the ones whose answer is short.
The rest of this page is what that means for your family. The day, the people, the credits, the college part, and the door, which is open year-round.
“The difference is the building.”
3.0Accreditation
Accredited, and what that word actually does
The school is regionally accredited. In K-12 marketing, the word “accredited” gets used loosely enough that it pays to be specific about which kind. Regional accreditation is the recognition standard the country’s colleges actually look for when a transcript hits the admissions office. It is the same standard the established brick-and-mortar private schools in Colorado carry, the same standard the public school down the street carries, the same standard the boarding schools in New England carry.
What it means in practice is small and large at the same time. Small: the credits transfer. Large: nobody downstream of this school has to translate anything. The receiving high school reads the transcript and accepts the credits. The college admissions office reads the GPA on the 4.0 scale and recognizes the course list. The FAFSA office accepts the diploma without asking follow-up questions. The NCAA Eligibility Center accepts the academic record for student-athletes who plan to play in college.
If a school has to be sold to you as accredited with footnotes (working toward it, partnered with an accredited school, issues its own diploma), the word is doing different work in that sentence than it does in this one. The substance test for accreditation is whether the people downstream have to translate. Here they don’t.
For context on how much this matters: NACAC (the National Association for College Admission Counseling) found in its State of College Admission survey that accredited-program signal is one of the factors college admissions offices weight when reading a non-traditional transcript. Translation: the accreditation we hold is the same signal the registrar at any in-state college (and most out-of-state ones) is trained to recognize.
Read more about what accreditation means in practice on the accreditation page, and how the diploma functions on the online high school diploma page.
4.0Grade bands
K through 12, by grade band
The school covers kindergarten through twelfth grade. That gets said in one sentence by a lot of websites. It conceals a fair amount of work behind the sentence.
The grades where a parent at the kitchen table is the assumption, not a backup plan.
Kindergarten through fifth
Phonics, reading, the long arithmetic march from counting to long division, the science a curious six-year-old wants (weather, the body, where the dinosaurs went), and the history that introduces them to the country they live in. Lessons are short. Hands-on activities punctuate the screen time. A parent or another adult in the room is part of the design, not a workaround. The online elementary school page lays out how K-5 actually runs day to day. Families starting all the way at kindergarten can begin at any point in the year.
Sixth through eighth
The middle years. Pre-algebra into algebra. Reading shifts from learning-to-read to reading-to-learn. The seventh-grader, famously the most reticent species in the K-12 ecosystem, still gets asked, and gradually starts to answer. Science branches into earth, life, and physical. Writing becomes a craft and not just a task. The grade-specific pages walk through the year: seventh grade and eighth grade.
Ninth through twelfth
High school. Core courses (English, math, science, social studies), plus electives, with honors and Advanced Placement available for students who want them . AP chemistry is one example among many. Counselors help the family map four years to wherever the student is heading. The broader online high school page lays out the four-year shape; the grade-by-grade breakdowns walk through each year: ninth, tenth, eleventh, twelfth. The course catalog at high school courses and the full catalog list what’s available.
Credits to graduate. A GPA on the 4.0 scale. The format colleges expect.
What the parent’s day actually looks like
The student’s workload shifts by grade band. So does the parent’s. Honest numbers below; your family may run lighter or heavier.
The K-12 journey
Parent involvement decreases as student independence grows.
5.0The day
What a day actually looks like
There are no bells. That is the first thing most families notice. The second thing they notice is that the freedom requires structure, and the family is the one designing it.
A typical day is three to five hours of active coursework, broken however the family decides to break it. The student logs in to their dashboard, works the day’s lessons, submits the assignments, and moves on when they understand the material. A sample lesson shows what a unit actually looks like. Slow days exist. Fast days exist. A student who finishes a unit by Tuesday is not sitting idle until Friday; they move forward.
The pace question is the question every family asks first, so here it is plainly. Students move through material at the rate they actually learn it. The seventh-grader who needs three days on a unit gets three days. The ninth-grader who finishes the same unit in a single afternoon moves to the next one.
That sounds like a small detail. It is not. A traditional classroom moves at the pace of the median student in the room, which means the fast students are bored and the slow students are lost. Take the room away and the median goes with it.
A flexible day, illustrated
Three to five hours of active coursework. The family chooses when.
The week shapes itself around the family the same way the day does. Some families run a five-day cadence with Saturdays clear. Some run six lighter days. Some run four heavy days plus a Friday for a part-time job, an internship, a competitive sport, an instrument that requires hours of practice, or a younger sibling who is too young to be left alone. The school’s job is to make all of those workable. The family’s job is to choose.
6.0The people
Who the student talks to
The teachers are real teachers. Certified, on payroll, available by email and by scheduled call. They grade work, they answer questions, they explain a concept a second way when the first way did not land. The teacher is not a video and not a chatbot. The teacher is a person, and the person responds. (Resources, login help, and assignment guides for the student live on the student hub.)
There are counselors. The counselor helps with course selection, with college planning, with the high-schooler’s question about whether to take AP Calculus or AP Statistics next year. The counselor writes the recommendation letter when application season comes. The counselor knows the student’s transcript and the student’s name.
There is a help line for the operational questions. The password that won’t reset. The assignment that won’t submit. The question about whether to retake a unit for a higher score or push through. Counselors answer the phone, and the answer is usually short.
Parents are the day-to-day adults in the room. We are not going to pretend otherwise. The school provides the structure, the curriculum, and the teachers. The family provides the kitchen table, the encouragement, and the occasional reminder to please come downstairs for dinner. The parent hub collects the resources a parent reaches for most: weekly check-in suggestions, grading visibility, and how to read the student’s progress report.
If a phone call is not the right first step, you can also schedule a counselor call for a time that works.
7.0College
College, and what happens after
Graduates have gone to a wide range of colleges. The in-state picture is broad and the out-of-state picture is broader.
| Institution | Type |
|---|---|
| University of Colorado Boulder | Research, R1 |
| Colorado State University | Research, R1 |
| Colorado School of Mines | STEM, R2 |
| Colorado College | Liberal arts |
| United States Air Force Academy | Service academy |
| Metropolitan State University of Denver | Comprehensive |
| University of Denver | Private research |
| University of Northern Colorado | Comprehensive |
Out-of-state graduates have gone everywhere the country’s high-school graduates go. The mechanics are the part that matters.
Regional accreditation means the diploma is recognized by the FAFSA, by the NCAA Eligibility Center, and by college admissions offices. The transcript carries the GPA, the course list, the credit hours, and the honors and AP designations the way any private school transcript does. The Common App accepts the school’s profile. Counselors at the school write the recommendation. The student submits the application like any other senior in the country, with the school as the institution of record. The transferring credits page covers how credits earned elsewhere come in clean, and working after high school covers the path for graduates not heading directly to college.
8.0Enrollment
Enrollment, cost, and how the door opens
The door is open year-round. A family that decides in November to make a change can make that change in November. A family that decides in April can start in April. Mid-year transfer is what a meaningful share of our families do. The school is built for it. Families researching the broader landscape sometimes find the complete guide to starting useful background reading before the call.
Fifteen minutes by phone. Bring your questions; the counselor will not pretend to know the answer to one they don’t know. They will tell you what is and is not a fit.
Standard private-school enrollment forms (the admissions page lists what to bring), plus the request for the previous school’s records so the credits can be evaluated for placement. Usually moves in a few business days.
The student is placed in courses appropriate to the grade and the previous record. Login credentials arrive. The teacher of record for each course is introduced.
Whichever Monday the family chooses. There is no cohort that has to start together.
Cost
Tuition is published transparently on the tuition page; the school does not play the bracketing game where the price reveals itself only after you have submitted seven forms. Payment plans are available . the counselor walks through what’s possible on the call.
A fifteen-minute conversation answers most questions. Leave your name below and a counselor responds the same business day, or call now.
Take a week. Take a month. Come back when you’re ready.
9.0The state
Colorado, from the Front Range to the Western Slope.
Enrolling in this school is enrolling in a private school. Colorado families who enroll do not file a home-education notice of intent, do not maintain an annual portfolio, and are not subject to the annual evaluation requirement that applies to home-educating families under state statute. The school is the entity of record; the family’s administrative obligation on enrollment is handled with the school’s guidance, not with the district’s home-education office.
Sports are worth a moment of their own, because they come up. Colorado High School Activities Association rules in most districts allow a student enrolled in a private school to participate in extracurriculars at their zoned public school, including varsity athletics. The mechanics vary by district and by sport, and the counselor will walk through what your district actually does. Families with a competitive student-athlete should bring that up early in the conversation.
The state itself is large, and Colorado families are in all of it. The metro on the Front Range, the Springs, Boulder, Pueblo, the resort towns up the I-70 corridor, the agricultural east, the towns on both slopes. The lessons load the same in Telluride as they do in Aurora. The counselors are reachable from any area code in the state, and the meeting times work for a family in Grand Junction the same as for a family in Cherry Creek. The student in a ranching family near Lamar and the student in a brownstone near Wash Park are on the same school’s enrollment list. Same online elementary school. Same online middle school. Same online high school.
Where a family lives shapes the questions they walk in with, so Colorado communities have a page of their own: Brighton Online Homeschool K-12Commerce City Online Homeschool K-12Englewood Online Homeschool K-12Erie Online Homeschool K-12FountainGrand Junction Online Homeschool K-12Lafayette Online Homeschool K-12Littleton Online Homeschool K-12Northglenn Online Homeschool K-12Parker Online Homeschool K-12Wheat Ridge Online Homeschool K-12Windsor Online Homeschool K-12 in El Paso County.
10.0Frequently asked
Frequently asked
Is the diploma recognized by colleges?
Yes. Regional accreditation means the diploma functions the same as any private-school diploma at the college admissions office, at the FAFSA, and at the NCAA Eligibility Center.
How is this different from a public virtual program?
This is a private school, which means the school employs the teachers, owns the curriculum, and issues the diploma. The school is not part of the state’s public-school system.
Can a student enroll mid-year?
Yes. The door is open year-round. A meaningful share of our families enroll mid-year; the school is built for it.
Does the student need to be in front of the screen at set times?
No. The school is self-paced and asynchronous. The student moves through the material on a schedule the family designs, three to five hours of active coursework on a typical day.
How does grading work?
Teachers grade assignments and tests on the same standards a brick-and-mortar private school would use. Grades go on the transcript with the GPA calculated on the standard 4.0 scale.
Are honors and AP courses available?
Yes. Honors and Advanced Placement courses are part of the high-school catalog and available to students who want them. AP courses follow the College Board’s curriculum framework. Students who pass the AP exam at the end of the course may earn college credit, subject to the receiving college’s AP credit policy.
What about students with IEPs or 504 plans?
Families with existing IEPs or 504 plans should bring them to the enrollment conversation. The counselor will walk through how accommodations carry over and what the school can do.
Can a student play sports?
In most Colorado districts, students enrolled in private schools (including online ones) can participate in extracurriculars at their zoned public school under existing state policy. The counselor can talk through specifics for your district.
How long does enrollment take?
Days, not weeks. The conversation, paperwork, records transfer, and curriculum setup typically move within a few business days. Start date is whichever Monday the family chooses.
Does the school work for K-5?
Yes. K-5 runs differently than 6-12: a parent or another adult in the room is part of the design. The online elementary school page covers how the early grades actually run.
What does it cost?
Tuition is published on the tuition page. Payment plans and financial aid are available.
What if it’s not the right fit?
The conversation with the counselor is the place to figure that out. The counselor will tell you when something else might be a better match. A school that converts every inquiry is not really a school.
What happens to the credits if we transfer in mid-high-school?
Credits from a previous accredited school transfer in cleanly; the registrar evaluates the records and places the student in the appropriate courses. Credits from a non-accredited source may need a placement test or a portfolio review to map onto the four-year plan. The counselor walks through this on the first call.
Is there a graduation ceremony?
Yes. The school holds a graduation ceremony each year for seniors who want to participate. Family travels in; the ceremony is held in person. A student who prefers not to attend can request a diploma by mail.
11.0From here
Three ways from here.
Take a week. Take a month. Come back when you’re ready. The door is open year-round, and we will be here.