Updated October 23, 2026. Quick answer: The 2025 Schedule C chart has a single educational row: 611000, worded as “Educational services (including schools, colleges, & universities)”. It goes on line B. The chart has no row that names a tutor or a private teacher, so the nearby rows are worth comparing against the work that brings in most of your receipts.
The one educational row on the chart
Education appears on the chart once. Anyone teaching or tutoring on their own account starts by reading this row:
| Code | Wording on the IRS chart |
|---|---|
| 611000 | Educational services (including schools, colleges, & universities) |
Its wording is about educational services and gives schools, colleges and universities as examples in parentheses. A solo tutor is not named, so reading the row means deciding whether the general words about educational services cover what you do.
Filling in line A and line B
Line A asks for a description of the work: “Describe the business or professional activity that provided your principal source of income reported on line 1.” Line B asks for the code: “Enter on line B the six-digit code from the Principal Business or Professional Activity Codes chart” The code goes in the box on line B, beside the description.
As an example of the kind of description, not IRS wording, line A could say private tutoring in math and reading, or online music lessons. A subject and a format make the line A entry concrete; line B stays a number.
Rows to read alongside the educational row
A tutor’s work can drift toward other kinds of services. These rows are the ones whose wording sits near teaching, helping or running a program, and each is here because of its words, not because the chart says it applies to tutors.
| Code | Wording on the IRS chart |
|---|---|
| 611000 | Educational services (including schools, colleges, & universities) |
| 624100 | Individual & family services |
| 541990 | All other professional, scientific, & technical services |
| 812990 | All other personal services |
| 711510 | Independent artists, writers, & performers |
The individual and family services row is a social-assistance row, so it reads as help to people and households. The all-other professional row is a catch-all in the technical group. The independent artists row names artists, writers and performers, which a music or art teacher might notice in passing.
The chart’s rule has two steps: “Select the category that best describes your primary business activity”, and then “Then select the activity that best identifies the principal source of your sales or receipts”.
What the chart does not name
A search of the chart’s wording finds no row with the words tutor, teacher, instructor or lesson, and none that mentions coaching or training. The only education wording is the single row above. That means a tutor, a music teacher and a driving instructor all face the same blank: the chart supplies categories, and the person filing reads them. The instructions describe the codes as a way to “classify sole proprietorships by the type of activity they are engaged in”, which is a reminder that the code is about the type of activity, not a job title.
When teaching is one of several incomes
A teacher might tutor on the side, sell lesson plans online and run a summer program. The chart does not give each its own code on one form. The rule looks for the activity behind the principal source of receipts. If the programs are separate businesses, the instructions say: “If you owned more than one business, complete a separate Schedule C for each business.”
After you choose a number
The code sits on line B next to the line A description, and the rest of the form follows. Start from the overview at Schedule C (Form 1040). Payments from a platform or a school district may show up on forms explained at 1099-NEC box 1 or the 1099-K threshold page. Estimated payments are covered at the first-year estimated taxes page.
Edition and chart year
This page reads the 2025 Schedule C (Form 1040) and its 2025 instructions, the current files irs.gov served on 2026-10-23 (byte-identical to the archived copies). They are the files for the tax year 2025 return, filed in 2026. The schedule says “Attach to Form 1040, 1040-SR, 1040-SS, 1040-NR, or 1041”. Check the tax year printed on the schedule you are filling in and use the chart that comes with that year’s instructions, because a different year’s chart can list different codes or reword them.
Common mistakes
- Hunting for a row with the word tutor: the chart has one educational row, “Educational services (including schools, colleges, & universities)”, and nothing more specific.
- Describing the work on line B: the caption there is “Enter code from instructions”, and the description goes on line A.
- Picking a code by the subject you like teaching instead of the activity behind most receipts: “Then select the activity that best identifies the principal source of your sales or receipts”.
Related: Schedule C (Form 1040), 1099-NEC box 1, nonemployee compensation, The 1099-K threshold, and Quarterly estimated taxes in your first self-employed year.
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Answer againSources
- Instructions for Schedule C (Form 1040), Profit or Loss From Business (2025): https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040sc.pdf
- Schedule C (Form 1040), Profit or Loss From Business (2025): https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1040sc.pdf
Read from the IRS documents linked above on October 23, 2026. General information, not tax advice. Your own facts decide the outcome, and a preparer, the account provider or the IRS is the right place to confirm anything consequential.