Pharos Terminal · Grades 7–12
New lessons every day.Everything included.Open it and teach.
New Nexus Points arrive daily, built from real events. Nexus Points, lesson packets and full courses are all in one subscription, with every student at the per-student price.
$499 for two semesters for your first student · $399 for each additional student
New to homeschooling? Get the 30-day guide →$499 for two semesters for your first student · $399 for each additional student
Screens from Pharos Terminal, with sample data.
A guide for parents · Grades 7–12
Your First 30 Days of Homeschooling
A 20-page guide that takes you through the first month week by week. It’s nonpartisan, practical and sourced, and has a full section on the West Virginia Hope Scholarship.
Week 1Make it legal, then breathe
Week 2Get to know your learner
Week 3Choose materials
Week 4Build your rhythm
About the West Virginia Hope ScholarshipThe guide explains what the Hope Scholarship program is and how families apply. It describes the program only.
Plus sample schedules for grades 7–8 and 9–12, a printable planning worksheet and a learning log.
Get the guide
Download it right after you sign up.
You’ll get the download link on this page right away. We’ll also email you a link to confirm your address before sending anything else. See our privacy policy. Not legal or financial advice.
One complete solution
Three layers. One price.
Three layers of lessons work together inside Pharos Terminal, and all three are included at one price.
Timely · daily
Nexus Points
New Nexus Points arrive daily. Each turns a real event into a lesson ready to teach, with its sources attached, discussion questions, a writing task and a Teaching Value score from 0 to 100.
Example Nexus Point
$410 Million of Asks, One Budget: West Virginia’s School-Funding Draft Gets Its First Hearing
Civics & Government · Teaching Value 91 · about 1 hour
Deeper · aligned to standards
Lesson packets
Multi-day units with a parent guide, readings, activities and a portfolio page, aligned to West Virginia Department of Education academic standards in English language arts, science and social studies.
Example packet
The Crossing: Trenton at 250
History · sessions from “The darkest December” to “The war in the West, and the essay” · Teaching Value 89
Intensive · weeks, not days
Courses
Full courses that run for weeks, not days, each with its own introduction and a note for the parent. New courses are added as they’re finished.
Example course
Hemingway at War
A Farewell to Arms and For Whom the Bell Tolls: what war costs the men who fight it · Grades 10–12 · 7 weeks
Special projects are included too: the war course series and the science fiction series.
All three, one Pharos Terminal subscription: $499 for two semesters for your first student.See pricing ›
For the parent · Pharos Terminal at work
It runs your school year, not just your lessons.
Pharos Terminal helps with the planning, record-keeping and year-end paperwork around the lessons. Pick a student, and everything you assign, teach and log lands in one record.
1
The parent tracker
Press Mark done when a lesson is finished. The Tracker records the date, hours, subject and standards for each student, and adds up hours by subject.
2
Assign to each student
Assign a Nexus Point, a whole lesson packet, one session or a course lesson to one or more students, with an optional due date and note. Each student sees it on their own Dashboard.
3
Standards tracking
Lesson packets list the West Virginia Department of Education academic standards they’re aligned to in English language arts, science and social studies, and the tracker records them with each lesson you log.
4
A year-end portfolio
Pick the school year and press Export year-end portfolio: the year’s lessons, hours by subject, the standards, your work samples and a page per subject for your reviewer’s narrative.
Every student can have their own sign-in and pagesView as: see a lesson exactly as your student willPhone, iPad and laptop
Screens from Pharos Terminal, with a sample student and sample data.
Courses · included with every active subscription
Open any course and read the introduction.
Every course is included with every active subscription. Each card opens a preview of the course, with its introduction and the note for parents. A subscription unlocks the lessons.
History course
Take Care: The American Presidents and the Power They Hold
Article II, the precedents and the court cases: what presidents signed, vetoed, ordered and said, and what Congress and the courts did in reply.
Grades 10–12 · 7 weeks
See the course →Preview
Literature course
Promise and Record: Communism and the Writers Who Answered It
The promise in its own words, then the record: Animal Farm, Nineteen Eighty-Four, Darkness at Noon and the witnesses of Cuba.
Grades 10–12 · 8 weeks
See the course →Preview
History course
Hollywood on History
Glory to WarGames: eleven war films, tested scene by scene against the record from every side.
Grades 11–12 · 13 weeks
See the course →Preview
Science course
Could It Really Work? The Real Science of Science Fiction
Star Trek to Blade Runner: the real science behind six famous stories, and a check your student runs every day.
Grades 9–12 · 7 weeks
See the course →Preview
Literature course
Hemingway at War
A Farewell to Arms and For Whom the Bell Tolls: what war costs the men who fight it.
Grades 10–12 · 7 weeks
See the course →Preview
Literature course
Steinbeck Country
Cannery Row to East of Eden.
Grades 10–12 · 7 weeks
See the course →Preview
History course
World War II: Depression, War and the Peace That Followed
From the Crash of 1929 to the start of the Cold War, in the record. More units follow as they’re finished.
Grades 9–12 · 18 weeks
See the course →Preview
Business course
Pitch to Profit
Find a real problem. Build the fix. Make a first real sale.
Grades 7–12 · 18 weeks · Entrepreneurship for the AI Age
See the course →Preview
History course
Through the Fading Darkness
The 1774 frontier, in a novel and in the record.
Grades 7–12 · 18 weeks · Lord Dunmore’s War, 1774
See the course →Preview
History course
Beyond the Fading Darkness
Virginia in 1775, from protest to war, in a novel and in the record.
Grades 7–12 · 12 weeks · Virginia, 1775
See the course →Preview
History course
Winter’s Ghosts
1776 on the Virginia frontier, in a novel and in the record.
Grades 9–12 · 12 weeks · the Virginia frontier, 1776
See the course →Preview
Writing course
Reality Writes!
Your student writes a real book. You sign off every step.
Grades 11–12, and advanced students from grade 8
See the course →Preview
Family Quick Start · 2 pages
See how easy it is.
The two-page Quick Start, from purchase to your first lesson:
- Buy and open your terminal
- Add your first student
- Open Today’s Nexus Point
- Assign a lesson, teach it, mark it done
- At year’s end, export the portfolio
Meet Zac · Writer, Historian, Researcher
Writer, historian and researcher.
Experience over theory, for families who teach at home. Zac Northup writes and publishes curriculum for homeschoolers, micro-schools and learning pods. You teach; he provides the material.
- Publisher and managing editor of National Guard Review, 1996–2003.
- M.A., History, University of North Carolina Wilmington.
Accuracy and Transparency
Pharos Terminal
3.3problems per 100 statements
95% range 0.9 to 8.2
4 problems in 122 checkable statements from 20 randomly chosen items: 1 wrong date and 3 details a reviewer couldn’t confirm.
One popular AI chatbot (Chatbot B)
11.4problems per 100 statements
95% range 6.2 to 18.7
13 problems in 114 statements. Most were details a reviewer couldn’t confirm rather than outright errors.
Item by item, it had 8.1 more problems per 100 than we did (95% range 2.0 to 14.9).
Clearly more problems than Pharos Terminal in this test
The other two popular AI chatbots
Chatbot A
0.9
95% range 0.02 to 4.7
Chatbot C
6.0
95% range 2.6 to 11.5
Problems per 100 statements. In this test, neither difference from Pharos Terminal was large enough to be sure either way.
Not clearly different from Pharos Terminal
Aligned to West Virginia Department of Education academic standards
Lesson packets are aligned to West Virginia Department of Education academic standards in English language arts, science and social studies.
Your records stay private
- Kept in a private, encrypted vault in a US AWS region
- No ads or analytics on Pharos Terminal pages
- Nothing from your records is sent to AI tools
Every student in your family
Each student can have their own sign-in and pages, at the per-student price: $399 for each additional student.
Parent notices on mature content
Packets carry a Content advisory and courses a For the parent or teacher note, so you know what’s coming before your student does. Students never see the parent notes.
Standards alignment is provided for planning and record-keeping. Pharos Terminal is not endorsed, approved or accredited by the West Virginia Department of Education or the West Virginia Board of Education.
Pharos Terminal · Grades 7–12
Open it and teach.
$499for two semesters for your first student
$399for each additional student
First 100 families to subscribe: $100 off each additional student’s first-year price, then $399 at renewal
Every course included, plus new courses as they’re released. Prices as of November 1, 2026.
