Home Educated Students Who Turned Out Just Fine

These are just a few of the many, many successful people who were wholly or partly educated at home. Keep this list on hand for when your parents or in-laws wonder out loud if home educating your children is a dead end.

Thomas Edison – invented the light bulb

Lewis Carroll – author of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and professor of mathematics at Oxford

Francis Collins – leader of the Human Genome Project, director of the National Institutes of Health, helped discover the genes for cystic fibrosis and Huntington’s disease

Andrew Wyeth – painter, winner of the National Medal of Arts and the Presidential Medal of Freedom

Michelle Kwan – figure skater, Olympic medalist, five-time world champion, nine-time U.S. champion, TV sports commentator

Abigail Adams – gave John Adams some of his best ideas

Alexander Hamilton – created the American financial system, helped win the American Revolution, was the first Secretary of the Treasury, founded the Coast Guard, is on the 10-dollar bill, and is the subject of a Tony-winning musical

J.R.R. Tolkien – wrote some books you may have heard of, about a very popular piece of jewelry

Erik Demaine – youngest professor in the history of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Felicia Day – actress (Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog) and web-series writer (The Guild)

Agatha Christie- the world’s best-selling novelist

Ryan Gosling – actor (The Notebook, La La Land, The Big Short, First Man)

Erwin Schrodinger – won the Nobel Prize in Physics, helped develop the field of quantum mechanics