Homeschool application denied - "The image you selected does not appear to contain your school name."

[theranser]

Hi everyone,

I am homeschooled, and submitted my letter of intent to homeschool, provided to my school board, as proof. My application was denied on the grounds that the image of the letter does not contain my school name. How can I proceed?

UPDATE: Okay, I eventually worked through all of the automated 'reasons' for being denied, and just got this back.

[david-sanara]

Hi! I recently went through the GitHub Student Developer Pack verification myself, and I can share what usually works.

Since you mentioned in the update that you already went through all the automated denial reasons and still ended up with a final manual denial, the next step is to contact GitHub Education Support directly.
When the application is denied at that stage, re-submitting won’t work anymore.

For homeschool students, GitHub does accept:

✔ A Letter of Intent to Homeschool that has been approved or stamped by your school district
✔ A district approval letter confirming your homeschool status
✔ A document from an umbrella school / homeschool program that shows:
• your full name
• the name of the educational authority supervising your homeschooling

Important: the image must clearly show both names on the same page.
If the school/program name wasn’t visible in your previous upload, GitHub’s system will reject it.

Your best option now is:

Open a support ticket with GitHub Education:
https://support.github.com/contact

Mention that you are homeschooled

Attach a document that clearly shows your full name and the name of the district/program/umbrella school on the same page

Ask for a manual review

Support is usually very helpful with homeschool cases once the correct document is provided.

If you need help reviewing or preparing the document, feel free to ask!

[theranser]

I've submitted a ticket, but had to do so as a bug report, as they do not accept tickets for education support. They also say that they won't perform manual reviews. Hopefully they are able to help regardless.

Unfortunately, school boards in Ontario, Canada, do not provide confirmation of receipt for letters of intent, as it is not even legally required to submit this document in Ontario.

[david-sanara]

Oh wow, I didn’t know that Ontario doesn’t provide any kind of confirmation or receipt for the Letter of Intent, that really makes the whole thing a bit strange, I mean… GitHub is asking you for a document that simply doesn’t exist in your region.

If you don’t have an official LOI receipt (because Ontario never issues one), then the only thing you can do is include whatever evidence you do have, all in one single upload, since GitHub doesn’t allow Education support tickets anymore.

For example, you could try putting together:

a copy of the Letter of Intent you sent (even if it’s the parent-written one),

plus a short explanation saying that Ontario school boards legally do not issue confirmations,

plus a small screenshot or snippet from the official policy page showing that no approval letter is required or given.

All of this on the same page/file.
That way GitHub can at least see why you can’t provide the document they normally expect.

Also double-check that your GitHub full name matches exactly what appears in your document, because the automatic system is extremely strict with that part.

I know it’s frustrating, but sometimes adding a clear explanation inside the upload helps when the “normal” document doesn’t exist.

I hope that helps on your next attempt.

[MaybeTarun]

I feel for your situation - this is a really frustrating catch-22. GitHub's automated system is clearly too rigid for edge cases like Ontario's regulations. The responses above are spot-on about what to try next.

Honestly, based on what you've described, the reality is that GitHub Education's verification system isn't designed to handle regional jurisdictions where official confirmation documents don't exist. It's not your fault - it's a limitation of their current system.

One thing I'd add: if you do contact support again, try framing it differently. Instead of asking for an exception, ask specifically if they have any accommodations for homeschooled students in regions that don't issue formal documentation. Sometimes support staff have workarounds that aren't documented. Make it clear you've already tried the standard process and it's impossible due to regional laws.

Good luck with your reapplication. The Student Pack is definitely worth the effort to get.

[davevad93]

Hi @theranser,

Make sure to fill in your billing info and GitHub profile with your full name exactly as it appears on your academic transcript. Then log out and log back into GitHub before reapplying, because the application system gets stuck in a loop even after the required information has been updated.

If you still get rejected, submit the application using another device, such as a smartphone or another PC.

If none of the above works, I recommend you contact support by opening a ticket here, and explain your problem.