Enrollment Management

How to Start a Private School in 2025: A Complete Guide

Starting a private K–12 school in 2025 requires thoughtful planning, compliance with state laws, strong community insight, and a sustainable operational model. This updated guide reflects the latest regulatory expectations, enrollment trends, tuition insights, and best practices to help founders create a thriving private school that serves families and students effectively.

1. Understand the Role and Value of Private Schools

Private schools play a unique role in the U.S. education landscape. Unlike public schools, private schools are funded primarily by tuition, donations, and fundraising rather than government tax dollars. In 2025, about 9–10% of U.S. students attend private schools, equating to roughly 4.6 million learners nationwide. Private schools often offer smaller class sizes, specialized programs, mission-driven curricula, and unique educational environments that families seek as alternatives to public schooling.Public School Review+1

Private schools vary widely in focus, from faith-based missions to secular independent schools with rigorous academics. Most families choose private education for personalized attention, strong community expectations, and specific pedagogical approaches.

2. Legal Requirements and State Regulations

Know Your Regulatory Landscape

Private schools in the U.S. are regulated primarily at the state and local level. The U.S. The Department of Education does not require federal permission to open a private school, but state departments of education and local authorities set the requirements for registration, reporting, health and safety inspection, teacher qualifications, and compulsory attendance compliance.

State

Introduction

In 2025, many private K–12 schools are strengthening their college-preparatory credentials by offering robust advanced coursework options. These may include Advanced Placement (AP), International Baccalaureate (IB), honors tracks, and in some cases dual-credit courses in partnership with accredited institutions. For families evaluating private high schools, understanding these options is vital: they can impact academic readiness, workload, and admissions prospects. This article outlines how such programs typically work, the benefits and challenges, and what parents and educators should consider during the selection or planning process.

What Are Advanced Coursework and Dual-Credit Options in Private Schools?

Private high schools often provide several types of advanced academic pathways:

• Advanced Placement (AP): A program administered by the College Board that offers college-level courses and exams in various subjects. Scores may be used for college credit or placement, depending on the postsecondary institution.

• International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme (IB DP): An internationally recognized curriculum combining higher-level courses, extended essays, and a Theory of Knowledge component. IB emphasizes critical thinking, global awareness, and academic rigor.

• Honors or accelerated courses: Internal school offerings with increased demands and expectations, often covering material more deeply or at a faster pace than standard classes.

• Dual-credit or dual-enrollment options: In some cases, a private school partners with an accredited institution to offer courses that count toward both high school graduation and early college credit—though acceptance of college credit depends on the college or university the student ultimately attends.

These options differ from standard high-school courses in expectations,

Rolling Admissions

When applying to private schools, you will encounter two kinds of admissions: regular admissions or admissions with a fixed deadline and rolling admissions.

• Regular admissions or admissions with fixed deadlines are self-explanatory.
• The school will publish a specific date by which applications must be submitted.
• Rolling admissions are a little different and more flexible.

What is rolling admissions?

Rolling admissions refers to a school's practice of accepting applications until all their available seats are filled. The school will send an answer to your application within a couple of weeks, as opposed to waiting until a fixed deadline.

How does rolling admissions work?

Let's assume that the school begins accepting applications for the following school year on September 1.

• You could submit your completed application on September 2 and expect to have a decision back from the school within a time frame from two weeks to a month.
• At a school with a fixed deadline for admissions, you could submit your application on September 2 but not hear whether your child had been accepted until sometime in March, assuming the fairly common January 31 deadline.
• Many schools with rolling admissions have a priority deadline.
• You should submit your application before that deadline.
• Once all the places are filled, applications from candidates who would otherwise have been accepted will go on a waitlist.

Professor Allen Grove explains the various kinds of admissions in great detail. This is a

A Parent’s Guide to Private School Entrance Exams

There are many reasons why a private, independent, or boarding school could be an excellent option for your child.

• Private schools typically offer thrilling academic challenges, extensive STEM or arts programs, or other remarkable resources.
• Their student-teacher ratios are low.
• Their faculty usually have advanced academic degrees and strong professional reputations.

About 10 percent of students attend private schools nationwide.

• Private school admissions tend to be selective and in many cases competitive.
• To help distinguish applicants who meet admission standards, private schools use standardized testing.
• The Independent School Entrance Exam (ISEE) and Secondary School Admissions Exam (SSAT) are the most commonly used admissions tests for private, independent, and boarding schools.
• The High School Placement Test (HSPT) is often used by Catholic schools for entrance into grade 9.

The ISEE and SSAT are long multiple-choice tests lasting 2-3 hours and potentially covering above-grade-level content.

• For the 4^th grader applying to a private middle school, this might be the first time they have undergone two hours of solid testing with only one or two short breaks.
• The best starting point is always to have your student take a full-length diagnostic test.
• It’s important to know where your child is starting from so that you can help them get to where they need to be.

This video offers an overview of the ISEE private school standardized admissions test.

Editor's note:

I asked Attorney Sara Goldsmith Schwartz, whose "practice is focused on the critical issues facing school administrators and leadership," to answer my questions and provide some general guidance regarding best practices for enrollment agreements. This article is intended for the information of owners, administrators, and trustees of small to medium size private schools. ~ Rob Kennedy

The relationship between parents, students, and the school is determined by contract law. Can you tell us what that means?

The relationship between parents, students, and the school is based on a lot of documents, including the student/parent handbook, the code of conduct, the enrollment agreement, and more. The enrollment agreement, however, is the only legal contract, and it memorializes the relationship between the parents, students, and the school, binding the parties to the terms and conditions laid out in the agreement. The agreement assists schools in collecting tuition and fees in cases of non-payment and in assessing late fees in cases of late payment. However, a comprehensive agreement addresses far more than tuition and fees.

This short clip explains why contracts are important legal documents.

How can a professionally written enrollment agreement prevent litigation in the future?

A properly drafted enrollment agreement is a cornerstone of a school’s risk management strategy. For instance, it can help deter parents from bringing claims against the school, as well as help the school prevail on such claims.

An enrollment agreement