Delaware Homeschool Groups and Co-ops: Where to Find Your Community

One of the first things families ask when they start homeschooling is whether they'll be doing this alone. The answer in Delaware is no — and it hasn't been for a long time. About 3,920 students were homeschooled in Delaware in the 2024–25 school year, roughly 2.67% of the state's student population. That's a community large enough to support real networks, structured co-ops, and a range of support groups across all three counties.

What those groups look like — and which one is the right fit for your family — depends on your educational approach, your children's ages, and where in the state you live.

The Statewide Network: DHEA

The Delaware Home Education Association is the primary statewide advocacy and community organization for homeschooling families in Delaware. DHEA provides:

• Legislative monitoring and advocacy when homeschool-related legislation is considered
• A directory of support groups and co-ops across the state
• Annual events including a homeschool conference
• Email lists and online community spaces for connecting with other families

DHEA is the first stop for any family new to Delaware homeschooling. Even if you don't join immediately, browsing their resources gives you a map of what's available in your part of the state. Their group directory is typically more current than anything you'd find through a generic internet search, because it's maintained by people who are actively connected to the community.

Regional Networks: Crossing State Lines

Delaware's geography makes regional networks particularly important. Northern Delaware (New Castle County) sits in the Philadelphia metro area. Southern Delaware shares cultural and community ties with Maryland's Eastern Shore. The state is small enough that families routinely connect with groups in neighboring states.

Tri-State Homeschool Network serves families across Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland. If you're in northern New Castle County, groups based in Chester County, PA or southern NJ may be as convenient as anything Delaware-specific. The Tri-State network maintains connections to co-ops, field trip groups, and athletic programs that don't limit their membership by state line.

This cross-state reality is worth embracing rather than fighting. Your community doesn't have to be Delaware-only. Some of the most active homeschool co-ops serving Delaware families are technically based in Pennsylvania or Maryland.

What a Homeschool Co-op Actually Involves

A co-op is a cooperative arrangement where homeschool parents pool their expertise and time to provide instruction for each other's children. The structure varies significantly:

Teaching co-ops: Parents rotate teaching responsibilities. If you're good at chemistry, you teach chemistry to a group of kids while another parent takes your child for history or art. The obligation is usually one class taught for every class your child attends. This works well for parents with subject expertise and enough scheduling flexibility to commit to a regular weekly time slot.

Resource co-ops: Families share space, materials, and logistics without a formal teaching exchange. This might look like a weekly gathering where kids work on independent projects in a shared environment, or a field trip group that organizes outings together.

Drop-off enrichment programs: Some co-ops function more like a small private school one or two days per week — parents drop off students for classes taught by a dedicated instructor (sometimes a paid teacher, sometimes a rotating parent volunteer). Students get structured group instruction; parents get time for their own work.

The right model depends on your situation. A parent who works part-time will struggle with a high-obligation teaching co-op. A parent who retired early and has deep knowledge in science may find the teaching model deeply satisfying. New homeschoolers often do well in resource co-ops first, where the commitment is lower and they can evaluate fit before committing to a heavier obligation.

By County: Where to Look

New Castle County has the densest concentration of homeschool activity in the state, which makes sense given that it contains Wilmington and the bulk of the state's population. Groups here tend to be well-established and organized. The Wilmington area in particular has enough families to support co-ops organized by educational philosophy (classical, Charlotte Mason, eclectic, secular, Christian) rather than just by geography.

Kent County, centered on Dover, has a significant military homeschool community tied to Dover Air Force Base. Dover AFB families represent a meaningful segment of the Delaware homeschool population — military families frequently choose homeschooling because it provides continuity across PCS moves. If you're a military family, connecting with the AFB's family support resources will point you toward active groups that specifically welcome and understand the military homeschool experience.

Sussex County homeschoolers tend to connect more frequently with Maryland's Eastern Shore community. Rehoboth Beach, Lewes, and Milford families often find active groups that straddle the Delaware-Maryland line. The Sussex County area also has a growing full-time resident community (separate from the seasonal population), which means co-ops and groups have become more stable in recent years.

Online Communities and Facebook Groups

The most current information about active Delaware co-ops is almost always in Facebook groups rather than formal directories. Groups like "Delaware Homeschoolers" and county-specific variations (search "New Castle County homeschool" or "Sussex County homeschool") are where families announce co-op openings, organize field trips, and ask each other questions in real time.

These groups are also where you'll hear which co-ops are actively recruiting versus which ones are full or winding down. A directory that's six months old may list groups that no longer meet. A Facebook group post from last week will tell you what's actually happening.

Building Social Connections Without a Co-op

Not every family wants or needs a formal co-op structure. Delaware's homeschool community also connects through:

• 4-H clubs: Delaware has active Cooperative Extension offices in all three counties with 4-H programs that welcome homeschoolers
• Library programs: Many Delaware public libraries run weekday programs specifically for homeschoolers, including the Wilmington Public Library and the Delaware Division of Libraries' branch network
• Community sports leagues: Since DIAA bars homeschoolers from public school sports, community recreation leagues and club sports teams are the primary athletic pathway for most Delaware homeschool families
• Arts and music programs: The Delaware Symphony, Delaware Art Museum, and community theater organizations offer educational programs during school hours that attract homeschool families

Field trips organized through DHEA and regional Facebook groups are also a consistent source of peer contact — day trips to the Delaware Museum of Natural History, Winterthur, or Hagley Museum give kids shared experiences without requiring a formal weekly commitment.

Getting Started

The practical sequence for most new Delaware families is: register with DHEA, join the relevant Facebook groups for your county, and attend one or two in-person events before committing to a co-op. Most co-ops have a trial period or open house structure specifically because families need to evaluate fit before making a weekly commitment.

If your child is just leaving public or charter school, give yourself four to six weeks of adjustment before signing up for anything. New homeschoolers often underestimate how much decompression time kids need after leaving a structured institutional environment — and signing up for a heavy co-op schedule immediately can recreate the overwhelm you were trying to escape.

The Delaware Legal Withdrawal Blueprint covers the withdrawal process itself — including how to handle district communications and the EdAccess notification — so that by the time you're ready to start connecting with Delaware's homeschool community, the paperwork is already behind you.

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