Derek Owens

Derek Owens is a one-man online academy offering video-based math and physics from prealgebra through AP Calculus. It is the program that rigorous homeschool families send their teenagers to when the house math curriculum has run out of road and the child still needs a real grade on a real transcript.

Last updated: 2026-04-24 · Every Homeschool Editorial Team

At a glance

Method	Online academy / subject-specialist / video-driven self-paced
Worldview	Secular
Grades	6-12 (prealgebra through AP Calculus and Physics)
Formats	Video course (streaming), printable workbook, optional instructor grading
Cost tier	Standard
Parent intensity	1 (full service) / 2 (parent-graded)
ESA-common	Varies by state
Accredited	No (transcripts available through the paid tier)
Established	Homeschool classes since 2000; online course platform rolled out in the 2010s
Website	derekowens.com

Our scoreboard (1-5)

Criterion	Score	One-line reason
Academic rigor	5	Genuine high school and pre-college math and physics; respected by classical and rigorous programs
Ease of teaching	5	Instructor handles presentation; parent role is supervisory or absent
Content quality	5	Clean video instruction; careful problem selection; fewer errors than most textbook-plus-DVD packages
Flexibility	5	Students enroll anytime and move at their own pace
Value for money	4	Fair for what it is; dearer than a DVD-and-textbook kit, cheaper than a live online academy
Worldview scope	5	Fully secular and worldview-neutral
Visual/design	3	Whiteboard-style tablet videos; functional rather than stylish
Support resources	4	Grader feedback on paid tier; parent reports; responsive author

Who the publisher is

Derek Owens is a Duke-trained engineer (mechanical engineering and physics, 1988) who spent twelve years teaching physics and computer science at The Westminster Schools in Atlanta from 1988 to 2000 before moving to full-time homeschool teaching. Since 2000 he has operated in-person classes in the Atlanta metro area (through partner programs Metro Academic Studies and Eastside) and built a catalog of self-paced online courses that homeschool families use nationally. The material is his own writing, recorded as a series of short whiteboard-style videos with synchronized problem walkthroughs.

The Owens operation is small by intention. The website lists him as instructor, author, and owner; grading on the full-service tier is handled by Owens and a small staff. There is no corporate press kit, no convention tour, no celebrity-author fanfare. The reputation grew by word of mouth in the classical and rigorous-math homeschool communities, which trust Owens because his former students pass AP exams, enter STEM majors, and demonstrate the kind of preparation that programs downstream of him acknowledge openly.

The program is secular. Owens's academic background is in engineering and physics, not theology or curriculum philosophy, and the material reflects that orientation: mathematics and physics taught as they are practiced in universities, without religious framing in either direction. Homeschool families from every worldview send their students to Owens precisely because the content is subject-matter content, undistracted.

The core pedagogy

The house method is video-first self-paced instruction with paper-and-pencil problem practice and optional human grading. Each course consists of a sequence of recorded lessons, short videos in which Owens works through a concept on a whiteboard-style tablet with narration. The student watches the lesson, completes the corresponding problem set in the printable workbook, then either submits the work to Owens and his team for grading (full-service tier) or has a parent grade it from the included solutions (parent-graded tier).

Signature mechanics: (1) Short focused videos. Like CTCMath in cadence but more rigorous in content, Owens's lessons typically run ten to fifteen minutes and demand active engagement. A student takes notes, works through the problems he demonstrates on screen, and is expected to pause and try problems before he solves them. (2) Paper-and-pencil work. Problems are worked by hand, scanned or photographed, and uploaded to the course platform. This is deliberate. Owens's pedagogical view is that mathematics is a paper-and-pencil discipline and that screen-only problem work short-circuits learning. (3) Two-tier service model. The paid full-service tier includes instructor grading, written feedback on submitted work, and a course record suitable for transcript use. The parent-graded tier gives access to the same videos and materials at half the monthly cost and asks the parent to check the student's work against the provided answer key. (4) Start-anytime enrollment. Students enroll and begin at any point in the calendar, finishing whenever the coursework is complete.

The catalog covers prealgebra, algebra 1, geometry, algebra 2, precalculus, AP Calculus, physical science, and physics, plus Western civilization and computer science. The math sequence is the centerpiece and what most families come for; the physics course is the secondary headline, especially for families aiming at STEM-track college admissions.

A day in the life

A ninth-grader taking Algebra I with Derek Owens logs in at 9:15 AM. The dashboard shows the next assigned lesson, say, factoring quadratics. The student watches a fourteen-minute video, taking notes, pausing to try the example problems Owens sets up on screen. Then they open the printable workbook to the corresponding problem set, work a dozen problems by hand, and scan or photograph their work. On the full-service tier, they upload the scan to the platform and go on to the next activity; on the parent-graded tier, they hand the page to a parent, who checks it against the answer key and records the grade in a family gradebook. Total time per session: forty-five minutes to an hour, three or four sessions per week depending on pace.

Homeschool students on the full-service tier receive written feedback on submitted work, pointed, specific, and non-hand-holding. Owens or a member of his team will note where the algebra went wrong, not simply whether the answer is right. Parents receive automated reports summarizing the student's progress and grade. Students building a high school transcript use these records directly; the math and physics grades appear on transcripts submitted to colleges without the family having to manufacture a grading rubric.

What they do exceptionally well

Teaching voice. Owens is, plainly, a good teacher. His videos do not perform enthusiasm; they explain mathematics. Students who are bored by energetic scripted hosts and irritated by inconsistent textbook explanations tend to settle into Owens's register within a week. This is the central asset of the program.

AP and college preparation. Students who complete Owens's Algebra II and Precalculus sequence are well prepared for AP Calculus with Owens or elsewhere. Students who complete his AP Calculus and Physics courses arrive in university engineering and physics programs with appropriate groundwork. This is not a marketing claim about the program, it is the lived experience of a generation of homeschool students who went through Owens on their way to STEM majors.

Fair price for what it is. The full-service tier is $65 per month with a nine-month maximum, and the parent-graded tier is half that at $32.50 per month per the publisher's pricing page, plus a $15 enrollment fee and a workbook cost of approximately $25 to $30. A full year of instructor-graded math runs around $615 all-in. A family running two Owens courses simultaneously gets $10 per month off each. This is a real academy tier of service at roughly half the rate of comparable live-instructor online classes.

Physics specifically. Homeschool physics is a small and difficult category. Owens's physics course is one of the strongest non-religious options available, carrying real weight in college prep without tipping into the specialized depth that would require the full AoPS apparatus.

What they do poorly

Limited scope outside math and physics. Owens offers a small Western Civilization course and a computer science course, but the catalog is fundamentally a math-and-physics house. Families looking for a full online academy covering multiple subjects will assemble Owens plus other specialists.

No live cohort. The program is self-paced and asynchronous. Students who thrive on live-class interaction, peer discussion, or scheduled deadlines will find the self-direction a demand rather than a feature. Some students and some seasons require more structure than a self-paced video course provides.

Presentation aesthetic. The videos are whiteboard-style tablet captures. They are clear, well-annotated, and mathematically careful. They are not designed to compete visually with Khan Academy's modern graphics or a university MOOC's production value. A student who associates good teaching with high production will need an adjustment period.

Transcript handling is self-service. Owens issues a course record with a grade on the full-service tier, but there is no accredited transcript the way an Abeka Academy or Veritas Press online school might provide. Homeschool parents issue their own transcripts with Owens's records folded in. This is normal for homeschool families but can add administrative overhead for first-time transcript writers.

Who it fits / who it doesn't

• Pick Derek Owens if: you need rigorous high school math or physics without a live-instructor commitment; you want a secular program that respects the student's intelligence; your teenager is independent enough to watch videos and work problems without being monitored; you want instructor feedback on submitted work; you are preparing for college STEM or AP exams; you want pricing well below most online academies while retaining a serious course record.

• Skip Derek Owens if: your child needs live weekly class time and peer interaction; you want an accredited transcript issued by a third-party school; you need a single-platform, all-subjects online academy; your student cannot handle self-paced video instruction and requires a strict external schedule; your household strongly prefers written textbook study over video-driven courses.

Cost honest assessment

Online full-service tier pricing is $65 per month for up to nine months, or $32.50 per month for the parent-graded tier, plus a $15 enrollment fee per the publisher's pricing page as of April 2026. Students who finish early pay proportionally less. Workbooks run approximately $25-$30 per course, available through Lulu or as PDF printables after enrollment. Multi-course discounts of $10 per month per course apply from the second course onward.

A full year of Algebra I on the full-service tier with workbook runs approximately $615 all-in. The same course on parent-graded tier runs approximately $325. A family running two courses on the full-service tier pays roughly $1,100-$1,200 for the year.

Compared to Math Without Borders at $230 for a full course (one-time purchase of video and materials, parent grades), Owens is more expensive because of the grading service; parent-graded Owens is comparable in cost. Compared to Veritas Press live online academy at approximately $800-$1,000 per semester per course, Owens is dramatically cheaper and self-paced. Compared to Thinkwell video courses at $125-$150 per course, Owens is more expensive but includes grading and feedback that Thinkwell does not.

ESA eligibility notes

Derek Owens as an individual-instructor online course sits in the gray zone of ESA eligibility. Some state ESA programs approve individual online courses when billed as education services (Utah Fits All, for example, has approved a range of such providers), while others restrict funds to accredited institutions or approved-marketplace vendors. Owens's site does not operate a dedicated ESA workflow; families who want to use ESA funds typically process reimbursement through their state's parent-submitted receipt process. Because the program is secular, it avoids the worldview-specific restrictions some states apply to religious materials. ESA families should verify with their specific state portal and clarify whether self-paced online courses qualify before enrolling.

Alternatives

• Art of Problem Solving, a family would choose AoPS over Derek Owens for a more competition-oriented, problem-solving-deep math curriculum aimed at mathematically ambitious students, accepting a steeper parent and student time commitment.
• Math Without Borders (David Chandler), a family would choose Math Without Borders over Derek Owens for a lower-cost video-course purchase (one-time payment) built to accompany the Harold Jacobs textbooks, trading away instructor grading and feedback.
• Mr. D Math, a family would choose Mr. D over Derek Owens for a live-class option with cohort interaction and scheduled deadlines at a price closer to Owens's full-service tier.

How we verified this

Our editorial team reviewed Derek Owens's course catalog and pricing at derekowens.com and derekowens.com/prices.php, instructor bio at Metro Academic Studies, and sample video lessons on the Derek Owens YouTube channel in April 2026. We cross-referenced reputation and student outcomes against classical and rigorous homeschool community discussion and Physics Forums resource threads. Prices and program details verified April 2026.