Homeschooling in Italy:

Homeschooling in Italy is growing

Across Europe, more and more families are choosing to educate their children from home — for the flexibility, for travel, for wellbeing, or simply because it fits their child better than a traditional classroom.

In Italy, educating your child from home — known locally as Istruzione parentale — comes with its own rules, which we walk through below. Increasingly, families meet them by enrolling in an accredited online school, so their child still gets live teaching, structure, and real friendships.

If you’re exploring your options, here’s what you need to know — and how bina can help if you’d rather not figure it all out on your own.

Is schooling from home legal in Italy?

Yes. Educating your child at home — istruzione parentale — is a recognised right in Italy, grounded in parents' constitutional duty and right to educate their children (Article 30) and in education law. Compulsory education runs for ten years, roughly ages 6 to 16, followed by a training obligation until 18, and these can be met outside a traditional school.

There is no approval to wait for: Italy uses a declaration regime, not France-style prior authorisation. Families submit a written declaration each year to the head teacher (dirigente scolastico) of a state or accredited (paritaria) school in their area of residence, confirming they have the technical OR economic capacity to educate the child. The school cannot demand a degree, income statement or ISEE — only the declaration itself. New national guidelines (Ministry note 6640 of December 2025) and Ministerial Decree 218 of 11 November 2025 standardised the procedure, the educational project families outline, and how schools record and monitor results.

The key obligation is assessment: throughout compulsory education a homeschooled child must pass an annual proficiency exam (esame di idoneità) at a state or accredited Italian school to move up a grade. This is what makes the child's progress official, regardless of which curriculum or online programme the family uses at home.

What are the steps to school from home in Italy?

1. Submit the annual declaration — Each year, deliver a written declaration of istruzione parentale to the head teacher of a state or accredited (paritaria) school in your area of residence, within the annual school-enrolment window (recently late January / early February — for 2026-27 it was 14 February 2026). Send it by hand (keep a stamped copy), registered post or PEC, and confirm the exact date with your school.
2. Outline an educational project — Prepare a progetto didattico-educativo aligned with Italy's national curriculum guidelines (Indicazioni Nazionali), focused on the competencies the child should develop. The ministerial guidelines ask for this, and you submit it when you request the exam.
3. Run a structured programme at home — Cover the core areas — Italian, maths, a foreign language, science, history and geography, the arts and physical education. Enrolling in an accredited online school like bina gives you live teachers and a full, paced curriculum so the work at home is organised and complete.
4. Register for and sit the esame di idoneità — Apply to a state or accredited school for the annual proficiency exam by 30 April (the exam is held by 30 June); for the final lower-secondary state exam the admission request is due by 20 March. The child sits the exam to advance to the next grade.
5. Renew every year — Repeat the declaration and the exam each year until the end of compulsory schooling, keeping copies and the school's protocol numbers as your record of compliance.

An accredited online school like bina makes much of this simpler: we provide the curriculum, the live teaching, and the progress records your authority may ask to see — so you can focus on being the parent.