Texas · state guide
No state registration and no education-agency oversight — and then an ESA programme that locks out any school under two years old.
7 cited requirements · 3 dated deadlines · 15 sources · every claim as of , the oldest reading date on this page
The Texas Education Agency states plainly that it has no oversight of private schools: no registration, no approval, no accreditation filing. A homeschool is legally a private school, which is why Texas has no separate homeschool scheme at all. The duties that do exist are health ones — immunization evidence, vision and hearing screening records, spinal screening. Joining the ESA programme changes the picture completely, starting with a two-year operating history requirement.
This is the fork everything else hangs off. Get it wrong and every deadline below is the wrong set of deadlines.
No state registration, approval, or accreditation filing exists. Accreditation runs through private bodies the agency merely recognizes, and matters for credit transfer and teacher service records — not for the right to operate.
Texas Education Agency, Accreditation Status· read 20 July 2026
Legally a private school. The Texas Supreme Court held in Leeper v. Arlington ISD that home-taught children are exempt from compulsory attendance to the same extent as private school students. The agency states it does not regulate, index, monitor, approve, register, or accredit home school programs.
Texas Education Agency, Home Schooling· read 20 July 2026
7 requirements, grouped by what kind of duty they are. Every one links to the statute, rule or agency document it was read in, with the date it was read there.
Section 25.086(a)(1) exempts a child attending a private or parochial school that includes in its course of study a study of good citizenship. That is the condition — not a filing, not an inspection, not a curriculum submission. It is the whole statutory hook on which private and home schooling in Texas hangs.
Tex. Educ. Code § 25.086(a)(1)· read 20 July 2026
Article 63.001(13) defines “school” as a public primary school or a private primary school that charges tuition and has more than 25 students at a single location. All three conditions must hold, and everything is capped at children under 11. A tuition-free or sub-26-student micro school is outside the article entirely, and crosses into it on its 26th student. Once inside: on a request for a flagged record you may not say it concerns a missing child, you must take the requester's identity and photo ID, you must notify law enforcement immediately, and you may only mail records on or after the 21st day.
Tex. Code Crim. Proc. arts. 63.019–63.022; definition art. 63.001(13)· read 20 July 2026
The general standard in § 261.101 is immediate; only “professionals” get until the 24th hour, which makes the general rule the stricter one. Report immediately either way. Section 261.101(b) states plainly that “A professional may not delegate to or rely on another person to make the report.” Knowing failure is a Class A misdemeanour, rising to a state jail felony where the person intended to conceal the abuse. DFPS cannot accept anonymous reports — your name and phone are required, then kept confidential.
Where this is unsettled: The abuse-policy and training-records duties in Tex. Educ. Code § 38.0041 bind districts and charters only. They do not reach private schools.
Tex. Fam. Code § 261.101, § 261.103, § 261.109; policy/training § 38.0041 (districts only)· read 20 July 2026
Accredited private schools file an annual immunization status report with the state. The window is not a single date — it opens the last Friday in October and closes the second Friday in December, so it moves year to year. Unaccredited private schools are outside this reporting duty.
Tex. Educ. Code § 38.002(c); 25 TAC § 97.71· read 20 July 2026
Keep vision and hearing screening records for every individual in attendance, on a state-prescribed form, open to inspection by the state or local health department, and file an annual screening status report. Every admitted student must complete spinal screening or file an affidavit of exemption, and any screening report indicating possible abnormal curvature is retained — one copy kept, one mailed to the parent.
Where this is unsettled: The statute says “retain” for the spinal screening report but names no period. Whether these duties reach homeschools is genuinely unsettled on the face of the definitions, and no state page resolves it — do not assume either answer.
Tex. Health & Safety Code § 36.006(a), (d); §§ 37.001(b), 37.002(c), 37.003(b)· read 20 July 2026
Section 29.358(b)(2)(C) requires that the school “has continuously operated a campus for at least two school years preceding the date the school seeks approval under this section.” A school founded this year cannot apply, regardless of accreditation, enrolment, or demand. Plan the first two years on tuition alone.
Tex. Educ. Code § 29.358(b)(2)(C)· read 28 July 2026
Section 29.363(b) lets the auditing entity demand documentation of “any transaction occurring under the program,” with no temporal boundary at all, and no retention period appears anywhere in the subchapter. Contrast Arizona, whose Department may audit only the last two fiscal years including the current one. Money spent on non-approved expenses can be recovered from the school with interest, and evidence of fraud is referred for prosecution.
Tex. Educ. Code § 29.363(b), (g); recoupment § 29.364(d)· read 20 July 2026
Most of these bind only some schools — read the “applies to” line before putting one in your calendar. Several bind the family rather than the school.
Opens the last Friday in October, closes the second Friday in December
Annual immunization status report to the state health department.
Tex. Educ. Code § 38.002(c); 25 TAC § 97.71· read 20 July 2026
Within 30 days
Notify the comptroller if the school stops meeting any ESA participation requirement.
Tex. Educ. Code § 29.358(g)(3)· read 28 July 2026
Annually, grades 3 through 12
Administer a nationally norm-referenced assessment instrument, or the appropriate state assessment.
Tex. Educ. Code § 29.358(e)· read 28 July 2026
For a student enrolled in a participating private school, 85 percent of the estimated statewide average amount of state and local funding per student in average daily attendance. For a student with a disability, that amount plus what the child's home district would have been entitled to receive based on the child's individualized education program, capped at $30,000 a year. For a student not enrolled in a participating school — a homeschooled student — a maximum of $2,000 for a school year.
Administered by the Texas Comptroller, not the Texas Education Agency, which is a change of counterparty for a school used to dealing with TEA. Funds sit in a parent-directed account; a participating school must submit documentation that every employee interacting with a participating child is clear in the state reportable-conduct search engine, and must give the State Auditor proof of a third-party audit or financial review consistent with its accreditor's standards.
Two school years of continuous campus operation before applying; accreditation recognized by the Texas Private School Accreditation Commission or by the agency; annual nationally norm-referenced assessment in grades 3 through 12; reportable-conduct clearance for every employee who interacts with a participating child.
Tex. Educ. Code § 29.358(b), (e), (g); § 29.361; § 29.363· read 28 July 2026
Duties commonly assumed to reach private schools in Texasthat, read in the source, do not. Knowing what you don't have to do is worth as much as the list of what you do.
Texas teacher certification does not reach private schools — the mandate is limited to employment “by a school district.”
Tex. Educ. Code § 21.003(a)· read 20 July 2026
Enrollment documentation and the 10-working-day records-transfer duty sit on public school districts and on parents, not on private schools.
Tex. Educ. Code § 25.002· read 20 July 2026
Multihazard emergency operations plans are directed at school districts, not private schools.
Tex. Educ. Code § 37.108· read 20 July 2026
The research behind this page recorded what it could not confirm as carefully as what it could. None of the following is a claim that no requirement exists — it is a statement that no primary source for one was read.
Not covered. This research is state statute and administrative rule only, and zoning for a small school is a municipal question — a use classification, an occupancy threshold and a conditional-use process, all set by city ordinance. Rather than extrapolate, we have left it out. Ask your city's planning department which use classification applies to a school of your size in your building.
Every source cited on this page, with the date it was last read. Four hosts used here — codes.findlaw.com, law.justia.com, k12.ncseaa.edu and azed.gov — refuse automated requests but open normally in a browser.
Regulation is the first question a founder has and rarely the last.
8 states are covered so far, chosen on search demand and school-choice programme size. The other 42are not, and we would rather leave a gap than publish a page we haven't researched.
Attendance registers, immunization evidence, permanent records that outlive the school. A real sandbox school, no signup, no card.