How to Homeschool Legally in Colorado (2026): NOI, Odd-Grade Assessments & Records Made Simple

Short answer: Yes, homeschooling is legal in Colorado, and the state is one of the more flexible in the country. You file an annual Notice of Intent, teach the required subjects across 172 days, and assess your child's progress only in odd-numbered grades. This guide walks through exactly what's required, then shows how to make the record-keeping and assessment prep painless.

(This is general information, not legal advice. Always confirm current requirements with the [Colorado Department of Education](https://ed.cde.state.co.us/choice/homeschool) or your chosen school district. Requirements below are drawn from C.R.S. §22-33-104.5.)

The Basics: Who Has to Comply?

In Colorado, you must provide written notification once your child is 6 years old, and homeschooling obligations run until age 16. A homeschool is classified as non-public, home-based education, not accredited by the state or any district, and overseen only minimally.

Your privacy is well protected: a district can only request your records if the superintendent has probable cause to believe you're non-compliant, and even then must give 14 days' written notice.

What Colorado Actually Requires (Home-Based Education path)

1. File an annual Notice of Intent. Submit written notice to any Colorado school district (it doesn't have to be your resident district) at least 14 days before you begin, and re-file each year. The NOI is minimal, just each child's name, age, place of residence, and hours of attendance. The district cannot require curriculum plans, psychological profiles, or political affiliations.

2. Teach 172 days, averaging 4 hours per day, across the state-required subjects: reading, writing, speaking, mathematics, history, civics, literature, science, and the U.S. Constitution. You choose all curriculum and methods, nothing is provided or mandated beyond the subject list.

3. Assess progress in odd-numbered grades only, 3, 5, 7, 9, and 11. This is the one recurring accountability step, and it's lighter than most states (five times across a whole K-12 education). You choose one of two methods:

• a nationally normed standardized test (Iowa/ITBS, Stanford, CAT, etc., note Colorado's own CMAS state test does not satisfy this), administered by a qualified person selected by the parent. A parent may administer it only if they independently meet Colorado's statutory qualifications. The composite score must remain above the 13th percentile; a below-threshold score triggers the state's follow-up process, or
• an evaluation by a qualified person, a Colorado-licensed teacher, a private/parochial school teacher, a licensed psychologist, or someone with a graduate degree in education.

You submit the result to the district holding your NOI (or to a Colorado independent/parochial school willing to hold it). No assessment is required in grades K-2, 4, 6, 8, 10, or 12.

4. Keep records: attendance, test/evaluation results, and immunization records. Colorado's DOE and support organizations also recommend keeping work samples, reading lists, and a simple attendance log, useful both for the odd-grade evaluations and for building a transcript.

Where Ivy Waters International Fits, Honestly

The straight truth first: Ivy Waters is a Texas-based private school with a records platform. Enrollment does not replace your Colorado Notice of Intent or your odd-grade assessment obligation. Under the Home-Based Education path you file your own annual NOI and arrange your own assessment, that's the law, and no out-of-state school changes it. We won't pretend otherwise.

What Ivy Waters is designed to do is reduce year-end record reconstruction alongside your chosen path:

• Keep the records Colorado recommends as you go. Attendance, reading lists, and work samples can accumulate when you log learning throughout the year (dictated note, photo, quick line). Your family still reviews the record and supplies anything Colorado requires.
• Prepare with evidence, not predictions. Optional, parent-approved Ivy Waters International Standards suggestions can help you review what has been documented before an odd-grade assessment. They are not test preparation or a promise about results, and you still complete Colorado's assessment through one of the state's accepted methods.
• A planned official transcript and Showcase [Portfolio](/blog/unbundled-learning-k8-record) each year on top, genuinely useful given Colorado's own advice to keep work samples for transcript-building, and if your family ever travels, moves, or your child transitions to a conventional school.
• We teach nothing and dictate nothing. You keep full curriculum control; we offer real-life activity suggestions and specific curriculum recommendations you're free to ignore.

Think of Ivy Waters as a modern record-keeping layer alongside your Colorado homeschool. You handle the annual NOI and odd-grade assessment; IvyTracks helps you preserve and review parent-approved evidence, and the planned enrollment offer adds an official record only once issuance is operating and approved.

(For traveling families, the goal is one continuous record that remains coherent across moves; every receiving authority decides how it will use that record.)

Ready to see what you'd actually get?

Before paying, review the current Enrollment Agreement and the homepage's Included section; those are the source of truth for what Annual Enrollment includes.

It all runs on our Live-Log-Align Method: your child lives their learning, you log it in seconds, and, when useful, you review and approve suggested connections to the Ivy Waters International Standards. And here's the part no compliance binder ever gives you, years from now, those quick dictated notes and photos become the record you'll actually treasure: your child's words, at this exact age, kept.

Explore the planned Ivy Waters enrollment, $279 per student/year

Related reading:

• The Honest K–8 Umbrella School Comparison
• How to Homeschool Legally in Oregon
• How to Homeschool Legally in Pennsylvania

Ivy Waters International is a private school serving students from Pre-K through Grade 8. Based in Texas, where private schools are not accredited by the state, Ivy Waters International maintains its own academic standards without external accreditation and currently does not issue high school diplomas. Enrollment with us does not by itself satisfy Colorado's compulsory-attendance law, you still file your own annual Notice of Intent and complete the required odd-grade assessments. This guide is informational only and not legal advice; confirm current requirements with the Colorado Department of Education.