How many credits is a business worth on a homeschool transcript?

The usual convention for a high school credit is somewhere around 120 to 180 hours of work, which is where the Carnegie unit comes from and what most homeschool families use as a yardstick. A half credit is roughly half that.

Do the arithmetic honestly against a real business rather than against a hope. A kid spending three or four hours a week across a school year lands in half credit territory comfortably and can reach a full credit if the business is genuinely active. A kid doing ninety days intensively over a summer is usually a half credit, sometimes more if the hours were real.

Count all of it, because families routinely undercount. The reading and the written work. Time spent planning and pricing. The actual jobs. Time talking to customers, which is often more than anyone notices. Bookkeeping. Any research they did into what things cost or what competitors charge.

Do not inflate it. A transcript that claims a full credit for a kid who mowed four lawns is the kind of thing that erodes trust in homeschool transcripts generally, and it is not necessary, because a half credit in a genuine subject is worth more than a padded full one.

How to list it depends on your state and your own preference. Entrepreneurship, Introduction to Business, or Applied Economics all work. Some families put it under Career and Technical Education instead.

Requirements differ a lot by state, from essentially none to fairly specific rules about credits and subjects. Check yours before finalizing anything.

One thing worth noting beyond the credit: for a college-bound student, a business that ran for two years and made money is a better application essay than almost any elective on the transcript. Keep enough record that they can write about it accurately later.