Abstract: Homeschooling remains a novel concept in Vietnam and has yet to be recognised as formal education. In this study, homeschooling is defined as a combination of formal schooling and parents-led instructions, or a case of which parents bear the responsibilities to educate their children while schools only play a minimal role due to Covid-19. A survey on homeschooling demand conducted during the pandemic revealed that 10.9% (103) of surveyed parents chose homeschooling, and 37.3% (354) of the total 948 parents said to have opted to teach their children at home. This research aims to explore factors influencing parents’ decisions to homeschool their primary-age children based on five factor categories: Environmental Concerns, Quality and Equity in Education, Benefits of Homeschooling, Online Homeschooling Benefits, and Parental Reasons. The model accounted for 8.7% of the variance ($$R^{2}$$ = .087, adjusted $$R^{2}$$ = .073). . The model achieved statistical significancewith an F-statistic of 6.364 and a p-value of 1.16e-05. Two main drivers of homeschooling decisions are Environmental Concerns (coefficient = 0.0301, p-value < 0.001), relating to the desire to protect children from an unsafe environment, and Quality and Equity in Education (coefficient = 0.0435, p-value = 0.005), reflecting the demand for improvement in educational quality and flexibility in studying. The findings indicate that parents decide to homeschool their children during COVID-19 primarily due to parents’ concerns for their children wellbeingand a more flexible and personalised education.

Keywords: homeschooling, homeschooling choices, alternative education, educational decision-making, factors affecting homeschooling, Structural Equation Modeling (SEM).

Pages: 237-252