What Are The Major Home Schooling Conferences In The U.S.?

Are you thinking about getting your child home schooled? Do you want to find out more about home schooling before getting your child into it? Is your child currently being home schooled, and you would like the support of other people advocating home schooling? If your answer to all these questions is yes, then you should attend home schooling conferences.

Home schooling conferences are huge conventions held by various organizations who are homeschooling advocates. These conferences features exhibitors and workshops to support parents who prefer to have their children home schooled. Here are the major home schooling conferences in the U.S.

The FPEA Convention

The Florida Parent Educators Association, or FPEA, based in Orlando Florida, was established to serve home schooling families in Florida. They provide support for the legal right to home school, support group networking for homeschooling families, and local school board education and interaction. The FPEA is currently serving over 6000 homeschooling families, providing a much needed support network for home schooling parents through statewide conventions, local conventions and events, providing timely information and emerging trends, and by providing general encouragement, the most important one, all in accordance with Judeo-Christian Principles.

The FPEA does an annual conference, the last of which was held in Kissimmee, Florida last May 26-29, 2011.

The Southeast Home School Expo

The Southeast Home School Expo is a virtual smorgasbord of everything a home schooling parent might need. At their website, SoutheastHomeschoolExpo.com, you can find precious information that oftentimes cannot be found anywhere else. In the website, you'll find dates and locations of upcoming home schooling events, tutors for your kids, classes on how to conduct homeschooling, and, most importantly, support groups. They provide free counseling to parents regarding the education of their children, whether home schooled or not. If you want to start a local home school support group or convention in your area, they provide speakers as well, free of charge.

The HEAV State Convention and Educational Fair

The Home Educators Association of Virginia, or HEAV, conducts an annual convention that is open for everybody who wants to attend. The next convention is scheduled to happen on June 7-9, 2012. Like in other conventions, they provide everything that a home schooling parent might need; support, curriculum guides, classes, books, etc. They have one good innovation though. If you weren't able to attend the last national convention, they have recorded all the audio of the workshops of their previous conventions in MP3 format, which can be purchased from them.

The CHEA Convention

The Christian Home Educators Association of California, or CHEA, was established in 1982. It si a non-profit ministry established to provide information, training, and support to home educators initially in California, now nationwide. The CHEA hold 2 major conventions annually, namely, the Spring Conference and the Annual Convention in the summer. They keep busy throughout the year though, holding local homeschooling and leadership events throughout the state. Their next major conventions would be the 25th Annual Bay Area Convention to be held at the Sta. Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA on April 20-21 2012 and the 29th Annual CHEA Convention to be held at the Pasadena Convention Center in Pasadena, CA on July 12-14, 2012.

All of these conventions provide the much needed support and resources that home schooling parent and home schooling advocates need. If you feel that you are alone in your efforts to home school your children, why not try attending one of these conventions? Or you can do some research, call these organizations. Maybe there are some home school support groups in your immediate area.