Friday, February 17, 2012

At UIS, transition smooth for home-schooled students

Home-school students don’t seem to have a problem settling in at the University of Illinois Springfield, which is among colleges that actively recruit them, according to Judy Shipp, director of UIS’s counseling center.

“If someone has any kind of transition issues, regardless of the background they’ve come from, we can help them with those kinds of things,” Shipp said. “I can’t say that we have something specifically set up for people who have been home-schooled, and I can’t say that we’ve seen those kinds of issues.”

UIS does not track the number of home-school students who attend the college, said Leigh Brannan, an admissions counselor. She said UIS saw an opportunity in trying to attract home-schooled students.

“Within the past couple of years we’ve started an initiative to reach out to those students,” she said.

That includes recruiting at the Chicago Homeschool Expo, which gives home-schoolers a chance to meet up with educational vendors and admissions counselors for three days each August.

Home-schoolers were featured in an February 17, 2012, article in The State Journal-Register.

Read the article online