Kimber Academy

Kimber Academy is a network of LDS-oriented private schools and at-home programs built around a "God, Family, Country" curriculum, drawing heavily from the writings of Latter-day Saint author W. Cleon Skousen and teaching the original U.S. Constitution as a principled framework rather than a document to be interpreted against current constitutional jurisprudence.

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

At a glance

Method	Classical / literature-based / family-centered hybrid
Worldview	LDS (Latter-day Saint, with Skousen-derived constitutional framing)
Grades	K-12
Formats	Hybrid brick-and-mortar campuses, live online classes via Zoom, at-home self-paced
Cost tier	Standard
Parent intensity	3
ESA-common	No
Accredited	No
Established	1999-2001 (Kimber Academy brand); precursor Benjamin Franklin Academies late 1980s
Website	kimberacademy.com

Our scoreboard (1-5)

Criterion	Score	One-line reason
Academic rigor	3	Strong in American history and civics; thinner in math and sciences above middle school
Ease of teaching	4	Three-day school week with parent-guide model reduces daily parent teaching load
Content quality	3	In-house materials are coherent; Skousen-derived history and civics are the distinctive content
Flexibility	3	Three delivery modes work, but the curriculum is designed as an integrated whole
Value for money	3	Competitive against Latter-day Saint classical hybrids but not the cheapest path
Worldview scope	1	Explicitly LDS with constitutional-studies emphasis; narrow fit outside that audience
Visual/design	3	Functional rather than polished; classroom-materials feel
Support resources	3	Direct instructor contact and parent coaching in the at-home program

Who the publisher is

Kimber Academy was founded by Glenn J. Kimber, an American author and educator born in northern Utah, who studied at Weber State College and Brigham Young University before serving four years in the Air Force. Kimber married Julianne Skousen in 1965, a daughter of W. Cleon Skousen, the Latter-day Saint author whose works on the U.S. Constitution and American exceptionalism form much of the Kimber Academy curriculum. Kimber and Skousen co-founded the Freemen Institute in the 1970s to teach American history and constitutional studies; Kimber later served as president of the National Center for Constitutional Studies.

The school itself has gone through several iterations. In the late 1980s, per the Kimber Academy founding history and archived coverage, the Kimbers were invited by parents in Mesa, Arizona to put a seminar called "Tools and Techniques of Effective Teaching" into practice with sixty-five students, traveling weekly from Cedar City to Mesa. They named the effort Benjamin Franklin Academy and structured it deliberately against the public school model: only two age-based classes rather than grade levels, families welcome in the classroom, no homework, roughly twelve hours of instruction per week. The Glenn J. Kimber Academy was formally organized in 1999, with the first Utah campus opening in 2001 per Glenn Kimber's Wikipedia biography. The network expanded to multiple Utah locations and now includes a Kimber@Home distance program that brings the same curriculum into the home via live and recorded instruction.

Theologically and politically, Kimber Academy is explicit. The curriculum is Latter-day Saint in worldview, the Book of Mormon is a core text in the religious studies sequence, and constitutional-conservative in its civics framing, drawing on the scholarly writings of W. Cleon Skousen and the work of the National Center for Constitutional Studies. The academy's three-part "God-Family-Country" branding reflects those commitments directly. Families outside the LDS tradition or the Skousen constitutional-studies tradition typically find the fit uncomfortable; inside those traditions, Kimber is one of the more developed curricular options.

The core pedagogy

The Kimber method rests on a handful of structural commitments that reappear across every grade. School runs three days a week, roughly four hours a day, a pattern Kimber has held since the Benjamin Franklin Academy era and defended on the grounds that a compressed instructional week produces deeper attention and more time for family-integrated learning. There is no homework. Parents attend class alongside their children where practical and receive instructor-provided reading assignments to guide at-home work on non-class days.

The curriculum is organized around five content areas: history (primarily American, using Skousen's The Making of America and related texts), math (traditional arithmetic and algebra), language arts (grammar and composition built around classical literature and American documents), science (broad rather than specialized), and religious studies (centered on the Book of Mormon but also covering Old and New Testament). American history and civics is the signature strength; the Kimbers' claim is that a student who completes the sequence understands the founders' framework for self-government in a way that most public-school graduates do not. Whether a reader accepts that claim depends on their view of Skousen's historiography, which is influential in some Latter-day Saint circles and contested outside them.

Signature mechanics: (1) Three-day school week, instruction concentrated Tuesday-Wednesday-Thursday or similar pattern; (2) Family attendance model, parents welcome in class in the brick-and-mortar campuses, and in the Kimber@Home model parents function as the on-site coach between live classes; (3) Book of Mormon as a core text, not optional, not bracketed; woven throughout the religious studies sequence; (4) Skousen-derived history and civics, The Making of America, The 5,000 Year Leap, and related texts form the spine of the American history and constitutional-studies coursework; (5) Parent coaching in Kimber@Home, at-home families receive support from academy staff in building an ongoing education plan, not just delivery of materials.

A day in the life

A student enrolled in the Kimber@Home online program, fifth grade, attends live Zoom instruction three days a week. Tuesday morning begins at 9:00 with religious studies (Book of Mormon, 45 minutes, live instructor), followed by math (45 minutes), break, language arts (45 minutes), lunch, and a history session in the early afternoon (45 minutes). On the same day the student is expected to complete reading and writing assignments related to the day's topics, which run an additional hour or so under parent supervision. Wednesday and Thursday follow the same pattern with rotating subjects. Monday and Friday are non-class days reserved for parent-directed reading, family activities, and household responsibilities, a pattern Kimber has maintained since the Benjamin Franklin Academy era.

A student on the brick-and-mortar campus runs the same schedule in person, with the significant difference that parents are encouraged to attend class alongside their children. The campus schools are multi-age by design, not graded, with Senior (ages 12 and up) and Junior (ages 5 to 11) groupings reminiscent of the original Benjamin Franklin Academies.

What they do exceptionally well

The compressed week. Three days a week, four hours a day, no homework is a bold structural choice that other Latter-day Saint classical programs have not generally matched. Families whose fourth-grader completes the week's formal instruction by Thursday afternoon and then spends Friday on a grandparent visit, a piano lesson, and a scripture-reading session get something back that a five-day conventional schedule does not return. The trade is obvious, less total instructional time in some subjects, and Kimber's bet is that the trade is worth it.

American history and civics. Whatever one makes of Skousen's historiography, the Kimber curriculum handles American founding documents, constitutional structure, and civic virtue with a level of attention that most homeschool programs do not. A student who completes the Kimber sequence has read the Federalist Papers, studied the Constitution in detail, and memorized a significant portion of American founding rhetoric. This is the Kimber's distinctive academic contribution.

Family integration. Kimber's commitment that parents belong in class, that school should not colonize the family's week, and that instruction should reinforce rather than compete with family life is pedagogically serious and organizationally backed. The parent coaching offered through Kimber@Home is not cosmetic; it is a core feature of the program.

What they do poorly

Math and science depth above middle school. Kimber's curriculum is strong at the elementary level in arithmetic and in survey-level science, but the high school sequence in both subjects is thinner than what families will find at Abeka, Memoria Press, or a program designed around a dedicated math publisher like Saxon or Math-U-See. Families whose students are college-bound in STEM typically supplement. Kimber does not pretend otherwise, but the gap is real.

Narrow worldview fit. Kimber is designed for Latter-day Saint families who are also sympathetic to the Skousen constitutional-studies tradition. Families who are LDS but theologically uninterested in Skousen, or who are constitutional-conservative but not LDS, usually find the fit awkward on one axis or the other. The curriculum does not offer a "secular track" or a "non-Skousen history track."

Accreditation gap. Kimber Academy is not accredited, which matters less for elementary and middle-grade families than it does for high school. A Kimber Academy diploma is accepted by some universities (notably BYU and similar Latter-day Saint institutions) but families aiming at broadly selective secular colleges typically arrange dual enrollment, AP exams, or transcript-mapping work through a third party to bridge the gap.

Who it fits / who it doesn't

• Pick Kimber Academy if: you are a Latter-day Saint family and want the Book of Mormon as a core text rather than an add-on; you want a three-day school week with substantial family time built into the schedule; you value American history and constitutional studies as a curricular priority and are sympathetic to the Skousen historiographic tradition; you have a brick-and-mortar campus within driving distance or are comfortable with live online delivery; you want parent coaching rather than a ship-and-forget curriculum.

• Skip Kimber Academy if: you are not LDS and want your religious studies content to come from a different tradition; you are looking for college-prep depth in upper-level math and science; you want accreditation for transcript purposes at selective secular universities; you disagree with Skousen's historiography and want American history from a different scholarly frame; you prefer a conventional five-day week with a conventional grade structure.

Cost honest assessment

Kimber Academy's published tuition structure varies by program (brick-and-mortar campus, Kimber@Home, or Kimber@Home self-paced). Current rates are not posted on the public Kimber Academy website at the level of a standard catalog price; prospective families typically request a quote. Industry reference reporting and homeschool convention materials as of April 2026 place Kimber@Home tuition in the $2,000-$3,500 per student per year range depending on live instruction hours and grade level, with campus tuition somewhat higher.

Compared to American Heritage School, another Latter-day Saint classical hybrid based in American Fork, Utah, Kimber sits in the middle of the Utah LDS-oriented private school market. Compared to a self-assembled at-home classical program using Memoria Press Classical Core Curriculum with a religious supplement, Kimber is more expensive but bundles live instruction and parent coaching that self-assembled programs do not. A realistic all-in annual budget for one Kimber@Home student, grade 5, runs roughly $2,500-$3,500 depending on enrollment tier.

ESA eligibility notes

Kimber Academy is not a standard presence on state ESA marketplaces. The academy operates as a private school and at-home program under Utah state jurisdiction; families outside Utah generally enroll through the online program. In Utah, the Utah Fits All Scholarship allows some private school tuition expenditures and some curriculum purchases, though program-by-program eligibility shifts and families should verify with both the scholarship administrator and Kimber directly. Outside Utah, Arizona's ESA program occasionally approves individual tuition payments to accredited or approved private distance-learning academies; Kimber's non-accredited status affects eligibility. ESA-funded families should request a current eligibility statement from Kimber before enrolling.

Alternatives

• American Heritage School, a family would choose American Heritage over Kimber for a Latter-day Saint classical program with full accreditation, a larger student body, and a more conventional five-day school week.
• Ron Paul Curriculum, a family would choose Ron Paul over Kimber for a constitutional-conservative home curriculum that is not LDS-specific and is delivered entirely as self-paced video.
• The Well-Trained Mind Academy, a family would choose WTMA over Kimber for a classical program that is explicitly non-sectarian, accredited, and runs on a conventional high school transcript model.

How we verified this

Our editorial team reviewed Kimber Academy's public program pages at kimberacademy.com, the Our Story historical narrative, and cross-referenced against Glenn Kimber's Wikipedia biography, archived KSL coverage of the Kimber Academy founding, and the Voyage Utah interview with Julianne Kimber. Program details and pricing ranges verified April 2026.