Oh, there is no shortage of homeschool parents on this board.
Picking a curriculum is both crazy awesome and just as overwhelming. The past decade has seen an explosion in this space. So depending on the age of the students and what the parents really want out of the experience will impact choices. Do they want to homeschool using curriculum located online or do they want the full online experience with live teaching? Major difference. Classical or traditional? Investment or budget? The choices are endless.
Yes, LU Online Academy is one of the largest options available. Honestly we have never used it because it was never the right fit for our kids based on curriculum. But they do manage all of the paperwork and transcripts and are considered a private school by most colleges and public schools. That makes transfers easy.
The biggest player in the space is a name that will be familiar to most everyone with a Christian school background: Abeka. They essentially took ther standard curriculum and pushed it to the web. No surprises. Once again, it is not for everybody and wasn't for us. My sister spent one horrendous emester at PCC that taints my view of anything related to the Abeka mpire. But that's just me.
Here in the Lone Star State, Texas Tech created an online curriculum that doesn't use live teaching but provides accreditation and the administrative side of things in addition to the actual curriculum. I believe they have now taken it national. BJU (yes, that BJU) is huge in the curriculum space and has come up with some online solutions. But the stigma remains for some of us.
If they want the full online experience with live teaching and interaction between students then there are some nice options. My two high schoolers are in this situation. They attend
Logos Online School based in Moscow, ID. The brick & mortar school is the feeder into New St. Andrews if you are familiar with that outfit. All my kids' teachers have a minimum of a masters and some have PhDs. The curriculum is crazy rigorous and in some cases much more challenging than what I took in undergrad at LU. We have always used the Classical model for our kids who are liberal arts-minded. This school is not for parents just wanting to find something online. But the kids who graduate tend to hav great collegiate options available to them. My son was admitted to Texas A&M and had options at nearly every SEC and Big XII school. My daughter is a sophomore and if she maintains her grades and work ethic will have the Ivies, Stanford and Rice as options even though she is alll about the Longhorns.
The primary competitor for our kids' school is
Wilson Hill Academy in Austin. Frankly if we had learned about it first they would likely be there and my youngest who is in middle school might wind up taking this path. It is another rigorous classical offering with live teaching and student interaction. Teachers tend to bounce back and forth between the two schools.
A friend of ours was the headmaster at
Laurel Springs for years. They have a big reputation and it is very popular for kids who are sports phenoms dedicated to practicing their sport hours and hours every day. Not as rigourous but accredited making it easy with transcripts into college.
That's probably more than you asked. But this is a topic where I am well versed whether I want to be or not.