Census Bureau: ‘Significant Increase in Homeschooling’ to 11.1% in Fall 2020 4 Apr 2021 The U.S. Census Bureau reported in late March that 11.1 percent of K-12 students in the nation are now homeschooling, a significant jump from 5.4 percent when school closures went into effect in spring of 2020, and from the 3.3 percent of families who homeschooled prior to the coronavirus pandemic. “The global COVID-19 pandemic has sparked new interest in homeschooling and the appeal of alternative school arrangements has suddenly exploded,” wrote Casey Eggleston and Jason Fields for the Census Bureau, which gathered data for an “experimental” Household Pulse Survey that measured the “social and economic impacts during the coronavirus pandemic.”