Universities are impressed by SAT scores, whether or not they are homeschoolers’ scores. I have no argument with the motives of parents who choose to home-school their children nor with the many accomplishments of these children. My argument is with those who point to differences in the average SAT scores of home-schooled children and non-home-scholled children as evidence of the superiority of home-schooling. Mrs. riverdawg and I share the concerns you mentioned about the academic and social environment in many government-run schools, and choose to send our daughter to Catholic school, even though we are not Catholic.
We certainly considered private education, but between the expense, the mandatory parental participation (lunch room and janitorial duty weekly), the horrendously long bus ride in Lake Ontario’s snow belt, well, that pushed us to homeschooling.
Indeed - show a university a 1400+ SAT and doors open all over the place no matter where the education took place. A 1400 places the student in the top 5% of test takers and that is indeed impressive.