Do you know, it's taken me til nearly the end of the year, before I noticed that I've numbered these weeks wrong?! According to people in the know, it's actually week 49 this week, and that 2020 has 53 weeks in it. I'm not going to change it now, but thought it was worth commenting.
I haven't actually weighed myself this morning. Yesterday I was 91.5kg and have been bobbling around there for a while, so still not go below 90kilos. I don't have any defence, other than the Christmas overeating has already started for me - lebkuchen, iced mince pies, chocolate spread straight from the tub, all the usuals, lol. If I can get to the other side of Christmas without putting weight on, I'll be happy. I am trying to eat veggies most still. My husband and I don't have potatoes or bread often any more with our Sunday dinners, but pile up different types of vegetables, and my tastes are slowly changing.
I haven't got a graph today either. I was up all night with my pup (and then DD2 came downstairs in the middle of the night after a nightmare) so between the two of them, I haven't had much sleep), so when I woke up and played on my phone (sorry, the daily challenges of Woodoku, Sudoku and Killer Sudoku won't play themselves, ya know) my phone promptly died, so it's currently charging, disabling me from being able to update my spreadsheet.
The past couple of weeks, most my time has been taken up with HE stuff, which is pretty obvious with what I've been posting recently. There's still more to do, but I was glad I was able to take a day off and not switch my laptop on at all yesterday.
I've also been busy painting DD1's bedroom! It just needs a second coat of blue, the ceiling painted, and the carpet changed for laminate, then she can move in, and I'll be a step closer to getting my own work room! I want to paint it before I start working there because I know what I'm like - I'd fill it with all my stuff, then decide it'll be too much of a hassle removing everything to paint it, so it will never get done.
I'm aware I haven't written any book reviews for ages either. I currently have 1 or 2 that I'm still waiting to write, but haven't yet had the time, but I haven't read as much as usual recently, again because of my time taken up reading through various documents, guidance, and letters from LAs.
Part
5, and hopefully the last part. I quite concede that it would have
been quicker for you to read it through yourself last weekend, but
we’re here now.
HERE
is the link to the document I am reading through.
“Chapter 6:
Recommendations for National Government
It is vital that,
nationally, we have a system of oversight to ensure that all children
receive their entitlement to a formal, full-time education.”
A reminder,
children are not entitled
to a formal, full-time education.
Paragraph
110 from 2009/10 Children, Schools and Families Committee – Second
Report:The
Review of Elective Home Education - Children, Schools and Families
Committee(HERE)
states:
“As
outlined, under section 7 of the Education Act 1996, parents have a
duty to provide their child with a "full-time", "efficient"
and "suitable" education. As the Department's home
education guidelines state, there is no legal definition of
"full-time". They add: "Children normally attend
school for between 22 and 25 hours a week for 38 weeks of the year,
but this measurement of "contact time" is not relevant to
elective home education where there is often almost continuous
one-to-one contact and education may take place outside normal
"school hours"". The guidelines also cite the
following case law descriptions: an "efficient" education
described as one that "achieves that which it sets out to
achieve"; a "suitable" education described as one that
"primarily equips a child for life within the community of which
he is a member, rather than the way of life in the country as a
whole, as long as it does not foreclose the child's options in later
years to adopt some other form of life if he wishes to do so".”
(The
case mentioned being Justice
Woolf in R v Secetary of State for Education and Science, ex parte
Talmud Torah Machzikei Hadass School Trust. 1985.)
Back
to this report...
“As
an outcome from this research, we would therefore recommend that the
Department for Education considers the following actions, that
would support local government to discharge their duties in respect
of ensuring all children are able to access a formal full-time
education more comprehensively:
Raise the profile of
children missing formal full-time education
Our research has shown
that the current statutory definition of children missing education
does not capture many of the children who are missing out on a
suitable education. … We would therefore recommend that the
Government adopts a broader definition of children who are missing
out on formal, fulltime education, collects and publishes data on the
numbers of children who meet the definition and tracks the long-term
destinations and outcomes for children missing formal full-time
education.”
This is ridiculous, it
is quite unbelievable that a professional research company has
written it.
They have chosen their
own definition of CME that goes against guidance, law and case law.
Then say that loads of home educators are not providing an education
and that nobody knows the outcomes of children educated in that way,
and don’t even think to contact any Home Education organisations
who may be willing to share such information! As you saw from the
response to the email I said, they still don’t think they did
anything wrong by not contacting nor collaborating with home
educators.
“Resource local
authorities adequately to fulfil their responsibilities in relation
to ensuring all children receive a suitable education
The evidence gathered
through this research suggests that the lack of capacity and
resources within local authorities is one of the key barriers to
ensuring that all children receive a suitable formal, full-time
education. ... In the current financial climate, few local
authorities have the resources needed for the true scale of that
task.”
So why exactly are you
trying to expand the definition of CME to include many more children
who are receiving a suitable, efficient and full-time education,
thereby stretching resources even further? It’s a crazy suggestion!
“Create a learning
environment in which more children can succeed”
This suggestion is aimed
at schools.
“Strengthen the
legislative framework around electively home educated children
In April 2019 the
Government consulted on changes to primary legislation that would
strengthen the oversight and mechanisms for reassurance around
electively home educated children. It proposed a new duty on local
authorities to maintain a register of children of compulsory school
age who are not at a state funded or registered independent school
and a new duty on parents to provide information if their child is
not attending a mainstream school. The purpose of these changes would
be to enable better registration and visibility of those educated
other than at school. The evidence collected through this research
suggests that both changes would be beneficial in strengthening the
oversight afforded to vulnerable children within this cohort and we
therefore recommend that the necessary legislative changes are made
at the first opportunity.”
The evidence collected
suggests it would be beneficial only because you have limited your
“research” to those who want a register. You did not attempt to
contact the people who would be affected by such a change, ie Home
Educators and HE organisations, nor ask whether this proposal would
actually achieve what it sets out to? (Using the definition of
“efficient” previously given, a register would certainly not be
efficient.)
“Epilogue”
“It has become
apparent very quickly that schools do not only provide education,
essential as that is. Schools are also the eyes and ears of a society
that cares about the welfare and safety of children. The first
essential line of defence for that very small minority of children
who are at risk from their families or the communities in which they
live. It is also clear that schools provide advice and support within
communities and an eco-system of social interactions that bring
families who live in a local area together.”
Rose-tinted glasses! (I
won’t say what my first though was on reading this.)
“Appendix A”
Children on a school
roll but not attending full-time, may include flexischoolers who have
permission from their headteacher to only be in school at certain
times, and they should not be grouped with truants, school refusers
or any other children in this category who may be missing education.
“Elective Home
Education: as shown in Part 1, a parent opting to electively home
educate their child can be a route into a child missing formal
education. This does not mean, however, that all children who are
home educated are missing education. What has been striking in recent
years is the rapid increase in the numbers of children being
electively home educated and, of those, the high proportion who are
vulnerable in some way. Therefore, we have used the 2014/15 EHE
figure taken at census (23,000)46 as our baseline for ‘children who
are EHE and receiving adequate education’. The uplift from the
2014/15 deadline to 2018/19 is 31,656. Given this high growth, we
have made the assumption that 75% of that uplift accounts for
‘children who are EHE but not receiving adequate education’. We
have assumed the remaining 25% growth might be accounted for by other
factors, including population growth. Therefore, we estimate the
number of children who are being EHE but are not receiving adequate
education to be 24,000.”
So, between 2014/15 and
2018/19 there was an increase in numbers of home educated children of
over 30,000. From these numbers only (I haven’t looked at the
original source) this could be an increase of 7,500 children per
year; which in turn, spread over 150 LAs (I know there are more than
this, I am just keeping the maths simple) that mean each LA has had
an increase of 50 children home educated per year. Given the number
of schooled children and how accessible information about Home
Education and the support on offer from peers and HE organisations,
this doesn’t actually sound like an excessive number.
Continuing with their
analysis, “we have made the assumption that 75% of that uplift
accounts for ‘children who are EHE but not receiving adequate
education’”.
Where does this 75%
assumption come from?
I thought it incredible, and looked like it
had been plucked out of thin air earlier in this report, but was
holding out until Appendix A to find out the rationale behind it. It
turns out there is none. They literally pulled it out of thin air,
made it up on the spot, and have absolutely zilch to back this figure
up. At the very least, I would have hoped there was a slither of
analysis – perhaps they contacted LAs and asked them for the number
of EHErs and the number of s437 notices issued or SAOs or anything to
give a glimmer of a number comparing how many EHE children there are,
to how many whose education is unsatisfactory. Or perhaps an
indication of the increase in s437s issued in 2014/15 to 2018/19, and
applied this number across the 32,000 children who are “newly”
home educated? But no, it is totally senseless. Not least because
suppose someone took their child out of school in 2015, it seems very
odd that you would still consider them “new” in 2019, when a
child in Y3 of primary or Y10 of secondary schools, would hardly be
considered “new” to school.
So that’s the end of
the document and my updates. Sorry it has gone on so long. For a 58
page document, this is page 32 of my rebuttal, and undoubtedly I
could have said a lot more.
I
have to admit, I’m getting tired now. In case you didn’t see my
update on facebook yesterday, not only am I reading through this and
watching the Education Select Committee on Parliament.tv, but I am
also trying to help out local HErs, who have been wrongly issued
s437s by our LA. They have since come back and said ‘oops, that’s
meant to be s436a’ but they still want loads of unlawful
information, and for it to be provided by this Friday, and with the
threat of an SAO. I am pleased to see that some HErs are fighting
back, each in their own way, either complaining by letter or email,
or asking for the corrected letters with a new time frame in which to
respond, or by seeking legal action to prevent this from happening to
others. In other news, I have been asked to join a panel of people
who represent HErs, so that is exciting and I’d like to know more
about that. And finally (for this rambly intro, anyway), I had a
response from ISOS to my email that I mentioned in Part 1. I have to
say, I’m not happy with the response, as they seem to want to wash
their hands of the damage and have ignored the affects by
ridiculously grouping HErs with CME.
My
letter:
“Good
morning,
I
have read through your recent publication on Children Missing
Education (Nov 2020) and have noted that you have used the phrase
“home education” 30 times, and “home educated” 37 times.
Given that Home Educated children are not Children Missing
Education, I am interested in why your document seems to fail to make
the distinction between these two separate groups? Similarly,
Off-rolling is not the fault of home educators, but that of schools.
Furthermore,
in your Bibliography, I cannot see a single Home Education
organisation listed has having been used in this research, and there
are many within the UK. Given this document is to influence
policy, and many of these recommendations will have a negative impact
for home educators, I would like to know why our needs have not been
considered?
I hope I am wrong, and I have misread or
overlooked a reference within the document itself. Please can
you point me towards which Home Education sites or organisations you
have used to complete this document?
Kind
Regards,”
Their
response:
“Thank
you for taking the time to read our report and for getting in touch.
In commissioning us to undertake the research the Local Government
Association asked us to:
Develop
a national picture of trends in numbers and characteristics of
children and young people who are missing a formal full-time
education;
Understand
the routes whereby children and young people end up missing
education;
Assess
the factors which are contributing to the increasing numbers of
children missing education;
Describe
the impact of children and young people missing out on education;
Identify
good practice in how local authorities and their partners can reduce
the numbers of children missing education;
Our
focus has therefore, throughout, been on those children who are not
receiving their entitlement to education, rather than those who are.
For the purposes of the research we define ‘formal, full-time
education’ as an education that is “well-structured, contains
significant taught input, pursues learning goals that are appropriate
to a child or young person’s age and ability and which supports
them to access their next stage in education, learning or
employment”. We define full-time as 18hrs per week. Under our
definition, we believe children who are successfully educated
at home would be receiving formal full-time education. We do not
equate formal full time education with school-based education and we
try to state as clearly as we can in the report that in the majority
of cases children who are electively home educated are receiving
a formal full time education, in the way that we have defined it for
the research. We state:
“not
all the children who are taken out of school at the instigation of
their parents end up missing out on their entitlement to education.
Far from it. Indeed, many parents provide an excellent education
for their children outside of school. However, the more parents
who opt for this route either out of desperation (because they simply
do not believe that the education they can access is meeting their
child’s needs) or out of fear of or hostility to the actions that
schools and government take to safeguard the well-being and
development of children, the more children are likely to miss out on
their entitlement to education.”
We
believe that we have not conflated the two groups of home educated
children and children missing education. However, we do believe from
the evidence that we have gathered from parents, headteachers and
local authorities that there is a subset of children who are
electively home educated in name, but in practice are receiving very
little education. These may be children
whose
parents have agreed to home-educate under duress (possibly as a
result of an off-rolling action by a school) but are unable or
unwilling to actually provide education,
whose
parents are home educating as a last resort but who do not feel they
have the skills or capacity to undertake this duty successfully
(often in cases where the school system is unable to meet the
special educational needs of a child)
whose
parents are using home education as a way to avoid legitimate action
for non-attendance at school or occasionally even as a means to
hinder safeguarding concerns being followed up.
These
clearly represent a minority of those children currently electively
home educated, but they are a concern. It is also a concern that
there is currently no definitive way of telling what percentage of
home educated children are not receiving a suitable education.
We
do not single out home education as the only possible route whereby
children might be missing out on their entitlement to education. For
example, we also draw attention to children who are currently on a
school roll and missing out on education either because they are
attending part-time, or because they are absent for long periods or
because they have been subject to multiple exclusions. Similarly, we
suggest that a proportion of children in alternative provision may
also be missing out on education.
In
terms of how we carried out our research, our focus on the children
not receiving their entitlement to education guided our choice
of organisations to engage. As such, we worked with the LGA and the
National Network of Parent Carer Forums to gather feedback from
parents who had direct experience of the issues we were exploring
through the research.
I
hope this helps to shed some further light on our research.
Best
wishes
Natalie”
I
think this does warrant some follow-up, but I haven’t got my head
around what it should be yet.
Back
to the report itself…
“Chapter
4: What is the impact on children, families and society of children
missing education?”
“Of
course, as we have outlined elsewhere in this report, the decision
for an individual child to leave a specific school might be the right
decision. There were examples in our parents’ survey of where that
particular choice has resulted in better outcomes for the child in
question. … However, in such cases, the parent has stepped in to
provide or commission the education that the child needs.”
And
that is exactly what ALL Home Education is – the parent
facilitating the learning of the child. It does not have to be
structured, it does not have to be formal. It does not have to
follow a timetable, a curriculum nor a school day. It does not have
to have a set number of hours each week (to be considered full time).
“The
detrimental impacts we discuss in the following sections are where
the child does not end up receiving formal, full-time education that
is suitable for his or her needs.”
I
repeat: It does not have to be structured, it does not have to be
formal. It does not have to follow a timetable, a curriculum nor a
school day. It does not have to have a set number of hours each week
(to be considered full time).
EHE
is not CME!
The
report then goes on to explain the impact/potential impact of a child
missing education. I don’t disagree with many of these points,
only to say that an electively home educated child is NOT missing
education, so should not even be mentioned in reports such as this.
“A
child or young person that misses full-time, formal education lacks
consistent access to teaching ... In missing out, either intermittent
lessons or large periods of a term, a child may miss important work
and fall behind peers.”
It
explicitly states in the EHE Departmental Guidance, that HErs do NOT
have to worry about keeping to the same levels as schooled peers.
“Local
authorities emphasised that it was not just missing out on key
periods of a school year impacting attainment that was a problem. But
that missing out on careers advice and progress meetings with
teachers and mentors to plan for the future also contributed to later
low employability. This is borne out in the research - the Badman
Review…”
Head.
Meet. Desk.
Mention
his name to any Home Educators in the past 10years or so, and you
will be greeted with a collective sigh. Mr Badman doesn’t like home
educators so was doing all in his power to stop it.
If
you want some more info (because frankly, I don’t have the mental
capacity to break it down and simplify it right now, here are some
links:
A
thorough google search will bring up many, many more.
Humorously,
this video of The Badman Song still brings a smile to my face.
“The
Office of National Statistics has also quantified the link between
low attainment and employability in the general population. …
Evidence provided by local authorities, parents, schools and national
bodies, as well as existing data and research, therefore, suggests
missing out consistently on education affects the educational
attainment for children and young people, which in turn has long-term
ramifications for employability through into later life.”
And
this is one of the problems with having a narrow, school-based view
of what education looks like. Home Educators are very aware that
there is no timescale for learning, and just because something has
not been learned by a specific age, it does not mean that it can
never be learned.
“Mental
health and wellbeing
Unpacking
the relationship between mental health and missing education is
complex. As we have set out already in this report, poor mental
health or emotional wellbeing, often linked to extreme anxiety, can
be one of the factors that leads to a child missing out on formal
full-time education. It was certainly a key consideration for many of
the parents who responded to our survey.”
If
you remove “formal full-time”, then it doesn’t read too bad.
“In
a very small number of cases local authorities identified how the
unsupported mental health needs of isolated young people who were not
in school had tragically resulted in suicide.”
“Not
in school” or “Children Missing Education”? They are clearly
two very different things. Almost unanimously, the anecdotal
evidence for Home Education says that the mental health of the
child/whole family improves once the child has deregistered, with
many parents wishing they had either made the change earlier, or that
their child had never gone to school in the first place.
It
would also be interesting to compare this statistic, with the number
of schooled children who tragically commit suicide.
“As
the NSPCC’s briefing on ‘Home education: learning from serious
case reviews’ (March 2014) outlines, children who are home educated
become isolated because they have no right to independent access to
friends, family but also professional agencies who could provide
distinct and specialist support.”
Well,
NSPCC is another group that doesn’t like HE due to stereotypes and
myth. In reality, Wendy Charles Warner reviewed all SCRs recently (I
can’t remember the date off the top of my head, but was in the past
couple of years – I’m sure a google would find it; I’ve even
mentioned it in previous blog posts) and in NONE of them was HE a
contributing factor in the death or serious neglect of the child.
“It
must be emphasised that although legally, home educated children have
the same rights to access mental health support in the form of CAMHS,
by not being in school, a child will have access to fewer trained
professionals who can spot warning signs around mental health, such
as school nurses, counsellors, external mentors and in-school
specialist support.”
Not
true at all. Any caring parent will want the best for their child,
and home educating parents are no different. If anything, HEing
parents often have to fight in order to access various support and
professionals! Having a lack of access is not, and should not, be
blamed on the parents.
And
incidentally, “school nurses” have a responsibility for all
children of Compulsory School Age (CSA), whether in school or not.
“Social
and emotional development
The
lack of social interaction experienced by children missing education
and the potential negative impact of this was a key issue highlighted
in our regional workshops.”
That
is simply because you have not asked people involved with home
education; individuals, families nor organisations. Pre-covid
(hands-up, things are a bit trickier atm with the constant lockdowns
and tiered lockdowns), in my local area, we had a minimum of 5 groups
or meets listed for every week day. As a home educator, you couldn’t
do everything, but there literally isn’t enough time in the day!
Home educators in other parts of the country report similar things.
If you live in a particularly rural or isolated area, you may have to
make a bit more of an effort, but with technology (proven, thanks in
part to covid), there is social interaction even if you so have to
stay at home for a period.
“Local
authorities expressed concern about children’s low self-esteem and
lack of confidence to interact with peers as a result of being
removed from or missing full-time education and the possibility of
poor emotional development in the longer term.”
Any
evidence for this? Noting, again, that being removed from education
(I’m assuming being expelled) or missing education (I’m assuming
truancy) is different and will have different impacts on the child,
compared to one who has been removed from school in order to be
EHE.
“This is echoed by significant research into the
importance of social interaction and the negative impacts (both short
and long-term) of a child that is not socialising sufficiently early
or consistently. Key impacts of a lack of social interaction include:
low confidence and self-esteem, in particular the lack of belief in a
child’s ability to manage stressful situations; anxiety; social
withdrawal; and a lack of ability to make friends and therefore, form
supportive social networks throughout their lives.”
I
wonder if any research has been done on the negative impacts (both
short and long term) of a child that is being forced to socialise
against their will, and consistent negative interactions, such as
bullying?
“The
impact that social isolation can have on a child’s life are
comprehensively examined in ‘Social isolation in childhood and
adult inflammation’ (August 2014) by Lacey et al. The study uses
data from the National Child Development Study (NCDS) which looked at
babies born in 1958 and examined them at age intervals until they
were 50 years old.”
That
report is:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306453014003126
and says about its limitations: “There
was no formal measure of childhood social isolation available,
however our measure comprises a question relating to peer withdrawal
(isolation) and a question relating to peer rejection (bullying)
which likely represent different aspects of social isolation. When we
looked separately at each of these questions, the associations we saw
were largely driven by the bullying item although the other item
about preferring to be alone was still associated with raised CRP
without considering the bullying item (results not shown).”
Given
that Home education was less
common in 1958, surely it can be assumed that the participants of
this study were schooled children, and as such it cannot be assumed
to be correct when discussion home educated children?
“Therefore,
their definition of social isolation is not identical to the social
isolated experienced by children missing education. Nonetheless, it
seems reasonable that similar issues might also be experienced by
children who are regularly missing out on exposure to peers and a
variety of people.”
No,
I don’t consider that to be reasonable, at all. (Again, not to
mention that EHE kids are rarely socially isolated.)
I
do feel like I’m repeating myself a lot, so apologies for that,
though I think it does bear repeating.
“Safeguarding
Throughout
our research a key message that has come out of the evidence gathered
is that schools and educational settings are a “protective factor”
in society…”
Instead,
I’d wager that schools (and in turn various authorities) consider
that schools and educational settings are a protective factor, rather
than there being actual evidence to indicate this. In the highly
publicised SCRs, EHE has never been a contributing factor, and all
the children were already known to the relevant authorities (not
limited to the LAs or Social Services).
“Crime
and exploitation”
This
whole section is mainly linking exclusions to crime.
“On
families and society Local authorities that we engaged in our
research were keen to express the broader impact children missing
education had on families and society as a whole. From our
discussions, the following themes emerged:
1.
Family breakdown
2.
Worklessness and poverty
3.
Reinforcing stereotypes”
It
would be interesting to see if there has been any research done
relating to these themes and home education? Many people report to
having grown closer as a family, through home education, because they
see their children (and in turn, the children see their siblings) all
the time, not just when they are tired and hungry after a long school
day, when they return home feeling overwhelmed and all the anguish
and frustration gets released in an explosion. As this happens day
after day, family relationships do not have the time to repair as for
large sections of the day, they are either asleep or separated at
school.
“Family
breakdown”
“Having
a child at home for extended periods of time can put strain on
parents who are not necessarily trained in home education. With
parents unable to leave a child alone, some mentioned how they had
lost friendships and/or opportunities to socialise themselves. For
some parents, they stated how high stress and home education had
contributed to bouts of anxiety and depression.”
Firstly
there is no training required to Home Educate your own children. The
EHE Departmental Guidance states that parents are not required to
have reached a specific academic level in order to HE. Whilst in
recent years, you can now get diplomas in HE, they are actually
totally unnecessary. Home Education is all about facilitating the
education, not that you have to be highly qualified and have to teach
from your own knowledge, what it is the child wants to learn. And
regarding the impact of HE on a parent’s mental health, I would
counter and say (anecdotally, as I have not done the research on
this) that forcing a
parent to offer a formal structured education to their children is
likely to do more harm, whereas a child who is allowed to follow
their own interests and learn autonomously is more likely to have
mentally healthy parents. (Please note the emphasis on forcing.
I’m a strong believer that they style of home education that suits
the child and the family is by its very nature the best for that
family, whether that be structured, unstructured, eclectic or
anything else.)
“Worklessness
and poverty
Both
from our parent survey and through discussions with local authority
officers, many voiced concerns around the financial implications that
a child missing education can have. This was particularly the case if
a parent had to quit their job to look after or educate their child
at home. But it was also problematic when families had to pay for
resources for home education or for specialist treatments, advocates
or professional reports if trying to support the child’s special
educational needs.”
When
a family decides to electively home educate a child, they do take
full financial responsibility for the education, whether that be
outsourcing specific groups/activities, buying equipment and books,
paying for exams etc. It is important that a parent realises this
before they decide to HE, and yet another reason why Off-rolling is
so bad.
However,
it is possible to HE and work at the same time, whether that be
part-time or full-time, in the home or outside it. It is even
possible to HE as a single parent on benefits. Yes,
there may be lifestyle adaptations needed, but just because the
family may no longer be bringing in the big bucks, does not mean that
HE should be inaccessible or inadvisable.
“Reinforcing
stereotypes”
Other
than this report reinforcing stereotypes about HE, this paragraph
doesn’t apply to us.
“Chapter
5: What Councils and local partners can and are doing
Area
1: Early identification and support
Area
2: Preventative and restorative action”
“...there
was not a single right approach to managing managed moves, fair
access and the return of pupils who had been electively home
educated;” point of
information: not all pupils who were HE have been to school before,
and additionally, they may not need active extra support for the
transition to school.
“One
way in which the principles of fairness and collective responsibility
have been put into effect in Telford and Wrekin relates to their
approach to children who are Electively Home Educated. In Telford and
Wrekin, the Council and school leaders have agreed that the fairest
approach to elective home education is that where possible any pupil
returning from being electively home educated returns to their
previous mainstream school. This has been agreed as an important
means of ensuring that elective home education is not used as a way
of removing a child from a school where it is not in the child’s
best interests …”
I
can see this being good to
prevent off-rolling. However, life isn’t always that
straightforward. What about the case where a child is being
incredibly bullied and so the parents remove them from the school
roll to electively home educate them; after some time (years), the
child’s confidence has built back up again, and they want to try
school. Will they be forced back into the same school with the
bullies?
“As
in many areas the rising numbers of children being electively home
educated has been a concern in Warwickshire.”
Why?
That is a deeply biased and discriminatory response by Warwickshire
council.
“The
Children Missing education team have agreed with schools and parents
that they will implement a two week ‘cooling off period’ for
every new request for elective home education during which they will
work with the school and the family to explore the issues and try and
find a resolution.”
It
depends what this ‘cooling off period’ is specifically for. When
a parent decides to EHE and deregisters their child, the school must
remove that child’s name immediately. There are no ifs, buts nor
exceptions to this that I am aware of. However, if the school comes
to an agreement with the LA to not fill that child’s place
immediately, but wait two weeks, that does not seem as harmful to HE
to me. Yes, there is a risk of scope creep, but there is with all
this stuff.
“Area
3: Re-engaging pupils who have been out of education
Area
4: Monitoring and tracking”
This
is the area most of concern to HErs, not lease because in the EHE
Departmental Guidance it states the LA has no duty to monitor the
education.
“Lastly,
local authorities underscored the importance of having
well-established processes for tracking children who are not in
formal, full-time education or at risk of missing out.”
Tracking
children who are missing education is a priority. EHE is not CME.
“It
also requires that the system has the capacity to follow-up cases
where it is not known whether a child is in formal, full-time
education, or the reasons why a child is not attending school
full-time are not known, or in some cases to confirm that a child is
actually receiving education where they are reported to be being
educated.”
And
informal enquiries are absolutely fine. Immediately issuing a s347
notice to new HErs or long-term HErs who have been told their report
is satisfactory, is not fine. <cough>Swindon<cough>
“In
response to rising numbers of children being electively home
educated, and a greater proportion of these children having a history
of exclusions, child protection concern or historic non-attendance,
Portsmouth and its schools have developed the most recent collective
protocol. Now all headteachers have agreed that they will not take a
child off a school roll until there has been a meeting between the
school, the local authority and the parent or carer. Schools have
also agreed that any child who has been electively home educated for
less than six months will automatically return to the original school
roll if returning to mainstream education. In the interests of
openness and transparency the local authority has also committed to
reflecting numbers of electively home educated children back to
schools. In the year that the new protocol has been in operation
numbers of electively home educated children have begun to fall,
whereas previously they were rising rapidly.”
It
was my understanding that schools must remove a child’s name
immediately, and similarly (except for special schools and specific
circumstances) the LA do not have to agree to the child being EHE.
Any meeting requested by the school or LA at this stage is optional
(are the parents told that?) and the parents do not have to attend. I
have also heard that some schools are automatically reporting parents
who want to deregister their child directly to Social Services.
These heavy handed tactics, and people’s general fear of SS, is
more likely to have an effect.
I
will continue my, hopefully
final, part 5 on Friday, if I can’t squeeze it in tomorrow evening.
“Destinations
of children missing out on a formal full-time education
From
the evidence provided by local authorities we have been able to
identify eight main ‘destinations’ where children missing out on
formal, full-time education might be found.”
I am
only going to quote the ones directly linked to home education,
rather than going through all the nuances of each of the statements.
“*Receiving
long-term tuition at home, either through an internet-based provider
or through in-person tuition, when that tuition does not constitute
formal full-time education in either duration or content.
*Elective
home education where the parent is not able or not willing to provide
education that would constitute formal full-time education in either
duration or content;
*Unknown
to children’s services where the child or family is not previously
known in any way by the local authority responsible for providing an
education place.”
Again
with the ‘formal’. <eyeroll>
Why
is a child being unknown to children’s services an automatic red
flag? If a family decide to home educate their children from the
start, there is no need to inform the LA (and there are many reasons
why it’s not a good idea), so why would a family want to?
I am
not entirely sure that these eight ‘destinations’ are the only
possible destinations, and I’m certainly not convinced they are all
bad.
Next
comes another diagram supposedly linking the causes and destinations.
Elective Home Education is listed amongst all the other negative
things.
“What
this diagram makes clear is that understanding the full extent of
children missing out on their entitlement to a formal full-time
education is not a straightforward task.”
No
shit. It’s especially ‘not straightforward’ when you don’t
understand the terms you are using, misrepresent them, and generally
seem to purposely confuse everything.
“Chapter
2: What are the numbers and trends in children missing formal
education?
The
Children’s Commissioner referred to children missing out on their
education as ‘invisible’. This is a powerful descriptor.”
It
is indeed a powerful descriptor. It is, also, unnecessarily emotive
and designed to give a negative emotion. Not least is it untrue for
elective home educators – as Graham Stuart MP said, we’re
“peculiarly visible”.
“Available
trends from published data
Although
there is limited national published data about this cohort of
children as a whole, there have been several insightful publications
which demonstrate the rising trend in numbers of children being
electively home educated and numbers of children leaving schools at
times other than normal points of transition.”
All
children who are removed from the school roll for home education
should be known to the LA. This is the responsibility of schools to
pass the information on, and there is no reason whatsoever why these
children should become missing.
“The
Associated Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) annual survey on
home education provides the most comprehensive estimate of the number
of children and young people currently being electively home educated
in England.4 The survey, which is completed by local authorities
every year, suggests that 55,000 children and young people were
electively home educated on census day in 2018/19.”
ADCS
‘About Us’ section says (https://adcs.org.uk/general/about-us):
“ADCS
is a membership organisation. Our members hold leadership roles in
children’s services departments in local authorities in England.
They specialise in developing, commissioning and leading the delivery
of services to children, young people and their families, including
education, health, youth, early years and social care services.
Working in partnership with other agencies our members work to
achieve tailored and joined-up services for children, whatever their
identified needs.”
Maybe
when I have more time, I’ll get to go through this document too (or
if someone else has done the work, let me know and I’ll put the
link here).
“The
Associated Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) annual survey on
home education provides the most comprehensive estimate of the number
of children and young people currently being electively home educated
in England.4 The survey, which is completed by local authorities
every year, suggests that 55,000 children and young people were
electively home educated on census day in 2018/19. This has grown
from 37,500 in 2015/16. As shown in the chart below, the numbers
climbed dramatically between 2016/17 and 2017/18 and have since
plateaued. The ADCS survey also shows that 79,000 children were home
educated at any point during 2018/19. This in-year variation suggests
that a relatively high number of children and young people may be
moving in and out of home education within an academic year. It is
worth noting that this data is based on voluntary local authority
returns. As parents are not currently required to notify their local
authority of a decision to home educate it may be an underestimate.
Other sources, including the Schools Adjudicator (December 2018) and
the Call for Evidence (July 2019) suggest that between 53,000 and
58,000 children are home educated. 5 6 Although there is some
variation on exact numbers, they all point to sharp increases, with
the Call for Evidence (2019) suggesting a rise of 40% since 2014/15.
The
ADCS survey also sheds some light on the reasons why parents are
deciding to home educate their children. While ‘philosophical or
lifestyle choice’ remains the most commonly cited factor, the chart
below also shows that health or emotional reasons are one of the
fastest growing factors for parents choosing to home educate their
children. This reflects some of the issues and concerns voiced by
parents in our survey and by the school leaders who engaged with this
research.”
All
these children are known to
their LA as being EHE, therefore by definition they are not CME.
“Where
the ADCS survey charts the growth in the number of children in home
education (one of the eight destinations we identified for children
missing education), the Education Policy Institute (EPI) provides
some compelling analysis on the number of children leaving their
current school for an unknown destination.”
The
Education Policy Institute (https://epi.org.uk/)
states:
“About
us: The aim of the Education Policy Institute is to raise standards
in education through rigorous data analysis, research and the
exchange of information and knowledge to help inform the public and
hold government and decision-makers to account.”
“The
report ‘Unexplained Pupil Exits from Schools’ (October 2019)
estimates the number and prevalence of young people who experienced
an ‘unexplained exit’ from secondary school, particularly through
off-rolling or managed moves. 9 EPI defines the term ‘unexplained
exits’ as any pupil move between terms when the destination of the
pupil is not known, for example, they do not show up on another
school roll. The data, compiled and analysed by EPI, shows that
unexplained exits grew by 8% over the three years between 2014 and
2017 from 55,686 to 61,123.”
“The
scale of the issue is similar to those becoming electively home
educated and is likely to capture many of the same children.”
No!
Children who are removed from schools to be home educated are known
by their LAs. If this is not the case, and schools are not fulfilling
their legal duty to inform the LA when a child is removed from the
school roll, this is bad behaviour by the schools, and electively
home educated families should not be made to suffer for this.
“The
FFT Education Datalab, in a blog series since 2015 called ‘Who’s
Left’, have demonstrated similar trends for children and young
people disappearing from school rolls. … They estimate that out of
an expected GCSE cohort, the number of young people who left state
education during secondary school rose from 20,000 in 2015 to 24,600
in 2019. Though FFT Datalab emphasise that not all those leaving
state education are of concern, there is a high number in this cohort
that are either not recorded as having sat GCSES or equivalent
qualifications or, if they did, whose results did not count towards
any establishment.”
The
FFT Education Datalab (https://ffteducationdatalab.org.uk/)
says “We
produce independent, cutting-edge research that can be used by
policymakers to inform education policy, and by schools to improve
practice.
We
are expert analysts of education data and use these skills to produce
impactful reports, visualisations and policy recommendations.”
Let
me repeat a bit of the preceding paragraph: “Though
FFT Datalab emphasise that not all those leaving state education are
of concern, there is a high number in this cohort that are either not
recorded as having sat GCSES or equivalent qualifications or, if they
did, whose results did not count towards any establishment.”
i.e.
There is a strong implication that if a student leaves the state
education and sits exams as a private candidate (so their results do
not count towards any establishment), then there is cause for
concern.
Home
Educators are well aware that when they start home educating, they
also take on full responsibility for the costs associated with that
education, including sitting exams. Sitting exams as a private
candidate will mean that those results do not count towards any
establishment, and why should they? Why should the hard work that
that pupil and their family have put into studying for exams, go
towards giving some establishment that has done nothing for them?
“National
estimate of ‘children missing education’
Without
a clear sense of how many children in England might be missing out on
their entitlement to a formal full time education it is very
difficult to be precise about the scale or nature of intervention
that might be needed either locally or nationally to address the
issue. We have therefore used this research as an opportunity to use
existing data published nationally, and complementary data held
locally, to develop an estimate for the number of children who may be
missing out on a formal fulltime education.”
“Our
sample is of 17 local authorities, with varying rates of response per
question. For reference, when scaling up the responses for our
question on the number of electively home educated children, we reach
an estimate of 75,000. which maps well to the ADCS’ figure of
79,000 for children who are electively home educated at any point in
the year.”
There
is then a diagram which states that 24,000, ie nearly 33% of home
educated children, are actually CME. They say that this number comes
from Appendix A, so I’ll go through that when I get there.
“Elective
Home Education
Not
all children who are home educated are missing education. For the
purposes of this analysis we have assumed that 75% of the additional
children being electively home educated, from a baseline of 2014-15
are those who will be missing out on a formal full-time education. It
is these additional children who are more likely to be those whose
parents have chosen to home-educate reluctantly due to shortcomings
in the education on offer for their child or those who are
home-educating as a result of pressure having been applied by the
school. In calculating the additional children in home education,
above the 2014-15 baseline, we have used the number in elective home
education on census day because there is a more secure comparative
timeline for this figure. Based on these assumptions we arrive at
24,000 for the number of children educated at home and not receiving
formal full-time education.”
Repeating
for emphasis: “For the purposes of this analysis we have assumed
that 75% of the additional children being electively home educated,
from a baseline of 2014-15 are those who will be missing out on a
formal full-time education.”
So,
after finding out that nearly 74k children are being home educated,
they decide to assume that three quarters of the difference between
2015 and 2019 are being failed?? What an outrageous assumption, with
seemingly no basis! I hope that Appendix A expands on this
reasoning.
“However,
it is important to recognise that this is an estimate based on a set
of assumptions. By substituting a slightly different set of
assumptions we can explore the likely range in children missing
formal full-time education.”
So
basically, you’re admitting that you can change the assumptions and
numbers in order to skew the ‘research’ however you like, in
order to get the response you want.
There
is then a table, which claims that the number of home educated
children who are not receiving a full time education, lies in the
range 16k-32k, which is astounding and not at all based on my
experience as a home educator in a local group, nor as part of
Educational Freedom, nor from any anecdotes I’ve heard. And to
repeat myself again, all these children that have been removed from
the school roll are, by default, known to the LA, and if there are
indeed this many children not receiving an education (which in my
mind is patently false), the LAs are not doing their jobs properly.
Having
said that, this kind of accusation could be exactly what has caused
my local LA to start ignoring due process, and they are issuing s437s
to many home educators as a matter of course, even if the EHEOs were
satisfied with their educational provision as recently as last month!
“We
cannot be certain of the overall scale of this problem. … However,
depending on how ‘full-time’ and ‘formal’ are defined it
could be as high as 1,140,000. It is unlikely to be lower than
210,000.”
There
is no legal definition of ‘Full Time’ and there is no requirement
for the education to be ‘formal’.
“The
ADCS survey into home education explores this issue in-depth,
indicating that in 2019/20, 38 of the 129 responding local
authorities estimated that 6-10% of those in elective home education
had Education Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) compared with 3.1% in the
general population.”
This
is no surprise given that children with SEN, indeed I’d go so far
to say all children, work best when the education is tailored to
their needs, and home education facilitates this much more easily
than education in any establishment or institution.
I
reiterate that because a child is home educated, whether they have
SEN or not, does not mean the child is missing education.
“Chapter
3: Why are growing numbers missing out on formal, fulltime education?
Factor
1: The changing nature of children’s needs and experiences
Factor
2: Pressures and incentives on schools’ capacity to meet those
needs”
“In
setting out these pressures, our aim is not to make generalisations
about schools’ practice …”
Interestingly,
they seem to have not kept to that aim with regards to home
education.
“The
first issue influencing how schools could respond to changing pupil
needs was the curriculum. School leaders and local authority officers
argued that changes to the curriculum, with a focus on a narrower
range of academic subjects and assessment through end-of-course
examinations meant schools were not in a position to offer the
breadth of subjects that might provide alternative pathways for
children disengaged from academic study or in need of a more
personalised curriculum.”
So
if school leaders and LAs both admit that schools are not offering a
broad and engaging education, why would anyone want their children to
go there?
“Equally,
however, while not all schools are engaging in these practices, all
local authority officers that we engaged agreed that they had come
across examples where a minority of schools in their local area had
engaged in these practices. The practices described by local
authority officers, and in part also recognised by school leaders,
included –
•
practices designed to manage admissions to the school in the first
place – these included practices of changing pupil admission
numbers, admitting pupils above that number so reductions through
pupil exits would appear less conspicuous, and practices of subtly
discouraging parents from sending their child to the school
(including by indicating that the school did not support children
with additional needs);
•
and practices designed to manage children out of the school,
including inappropriate use of attendance codes, part-time
timetables, informal exclusions, off-rolling, and inappropriate use
of permanent exclusion.”
So
when schools are engaging in off-rolling and other illegal/dubious
activities, there should be suitable sanctions. Home educators nor
flexischoolers should be punished for their actions.
“Factor
3: The capacity of the system to ensure appropriate oversight of
decisions taken regarding children’s entry to and exit from schools
Where
a child is missing from formal, full-time education, in the large
majority of cases this will not be the result of a decision that the
child has made, but rather the result of decisions about the child’s
education made by adults.”
Equally,
when a child is enrolled in formal, full-time education at school, in
the large majority of cases this will not be the result of a decision
that the child has made, but rather the result of decisions about the
child’s education made by adults.
“Aside
from the instances of illegal removing of children from a school
roll, in many of these instances there will be important nuances to
unpick in order to understand how decisions about a child leaving
school and potentially missing formal, full-time education have been
reached.”
Again,
there is nothing in law that says the education must be ‘formal’.
“They
noted that the statutory framework set out a clear duty for local
authorities to ensure that school-age children are receiving a
suitable education. The issue was not a lack of clarity within the
statutory framework, but rather a lack of capacity within LAs to
carry out the sort of detailed checking that is necessary to ensure
that where a child is not in school due to illness or has been taken
out of school to be home-educated these decisions have been taken
appropriately and the child is safe and continuing to receive a
suitable education.”
Given
that many EHEOs are not adequately trained in home education, are
unaware of both the law and the EHE Departmental Guidance for LAs, I
fail to see how LAs will be of any benefit to determine whether the
decisions were ‘appropriate’ or not.
“Local
authority officers argued that this issue had been compounded by two
sets of factors. First, they noted that there were some barriers to
collecting the right information to enable effective tracking of all
children missing out on formal, full-time education. These included
the discretion afforded to parents in whether they inform local
authorities of elective home education arrangements and the different
definitions of children missing education.”
What
barriers? Children are removed from school roll. School informs LA.
Simples.
Parents
don’t have to inform the LA of EHE, because that is the school’s
job.
EHE
is not CME.
“The
fact that there is not an agreed definition of children missing out
on formal, full-time education, and an accompanying national dataset
collection, helps to perpetuate what the Children’s Commissioner
for England has called the invisibility of this cohort of children.”
That
could be because EHE is not CME and the Children’s Commissioner is
entirely wrong about calling EHE children invisible.
“Put
simply, wider societal factors have meant that children are arriving
in schools with a combination of needs, often linked to disruption in
their family lives…”
So
it’s the family’s fault their children have SEN? No.
Yesterday
I got as far as halfway down Page9 of this 58 page document, so now
we start the section entitled “Who is responsible for ensuring
children do not miss education?”.
The
CME report by ISOS Partnership has a blue box detailing the
responsibilities of LAs and schools, and that is all correct. The
following paragraph says:
“The
Department for Education has consulted on the regulations and
guidance relating to elective home education and has acknowledged
explicitly that “a number of problems arise from lacunae or
shortcomings in the current legislation which have been drawn to the
department’s attention by local authorities and by local children’s
safeguarding boards”. They describe the current legislative
arrangement pertaining to home education as ‘designed for a
different age’. Indeed, a common theme that has emerged from this
research, both in the local authority workshops and the literature
review, is that the way that the range of existing policies and
guidance around pupil registration, attendance, admissions,
exclusions and education otherwise than at school comes together is
not seamless.”
I
would like to know what specifically has been said, and whether they
have differentiated between EOTAS (ie the LA providing the materials)
and Home Education (where parents facilitate the education)? My
guess is they didn’t even know there was a difference.
And
yet again, it is interesting
to note that in attempting to determine whether the regulations and
guidance relating to elective home education works or whether there
are any short-comings, they have failed to consult with home
educators – current, past, or any national organisations.
“Parents
are not currently required to notify the local authority if they
decide to home educate their child or make provision for education at
an institution other than a registered school.”
Because
HE is the default position. Parents are always
responsible for their child’s education, and it’s only if they
decide to outsource this education then the need to apply for a place
at a school.
“But
this provides no visibility for children who have never been
registered at a school or may move local authorities while being
educated other than at school.”
“No
visibility” is a red herring here. Graham Stuart MP said, when he
was Chair of the Education Committee, that home educate children are
“peculiarly visible”. HE children who have never been to school
are still registered at birth, registered with a GP, with an
Optician, with a Dentist – and that’s the bare minimum. My
children have attended (and therefore are registered with) Dance
schools, Gymnastics Clubs, Swimming Clubs, Play groups, social meets,
Science clubs, Computer Clubs, to name a few.
“In
April 2019 the Department for Education consulted on primary
legislation that would introduce a new duty on local authorities to
maintain a register of children of compulsory school age who are not
at a state funded or registered independent school and a new duty on
parents to provide information if their child is not attending a
mainstream school. However, no legislation has yet been brought
before parliament to make these proposed changes.”
Good.
There is no benefit to having a register of home educators.
“In
terms of the quality of education being offered other than at school,
there is no statutory definition of what constitutes ‘suitable’
education either in terms of curriculum, content, taught hours,
progress or outcomes.”
A
suitable education is defined as one that is suitable to the child’s
age, ability, aptitude and special needs, and enables that child to
live in their community as an adult.
‘How’
that education takes place is entirely different, and should not be
regimented. Even looking at schooled children (who are schooled
throughout their education), there is such variation in outcomes,
despite having been taught the same curriculum, content and taught
hours, that it is obvious that not all children learn the same way.
It is far better to enable children to be taught according to their
interests and abilities, so that they grow up still loving to learn,
rather than being desperate to leave school and learning behind them,
and then pass on to the next generation that learning is boring or
difficult and generally not cool.
“Furthermore,
local authorities have no express power to monitor on a routine basis
the educational provision being made for a home educated child.”
Good.
Given that, despite every schooled child being monitored to within
an inch of their lives, some children leave school without basic
numeracy or literacy, I fail to see on what basis the LA should be
able to routinely monitor the education of HE children. Not to
mention that the individual EHEOs have received little training in HE
at all, have little to no understanding of the differing styles of HE
– as demonstrated by LAs calling for this research.
The
third bullet point is about schools and their registers. My only
thought about this is that there should be a specific code for
flexischoolers because it is wrong that they may be considered CME
because they don’t attend school full time, despite an agreement
with the school to attend on a part time basis. Similarly, by having
a specific code, it may enable schools to allow more flexischoolers
without it impacting various league tables or Ofsted reports. That
said, this isn’t my area of expertise, so these are just some
general thoughts.
“What
are the routes whereby children can miss out on a formal full-time
education?”
There
is no such thing as missing out on a ‘formal education’, only
whether they miss out on an education or not. The only way a child
can miss out on a formal education is if the child wants or needs a
formal education and are not being provided with one. Please Note,
that by ‘need’ I mean in very specific circumstances. In my
experience, most children do not need a formal education, and would
flourish if they are provided with more autonomy than is provided in
most schools. This ‘need’ is prompted by the child, not because
some external agency demands it of the child.
“The
children who are missing out on a formal full-time education are not
a homogenous group and the pathways that have led them there are
equally varied.”
Correct.
We can help simplify this complexity for you, by removing the
children who are receiving a full-time education – ie
non-structured home educators and flexischoolers.
“They
have been generated through our workshops with local authority
officers, conversations with headteacher representatives and evidence
provided through parents in our on-line survey.”
Yet
again, absolutely no consultation with home educators nor HE
organisations.
“In
describing these routes, it is important to note that not all the
children captured by these descriptions will end up missing out on a
formal full-time education. Indeed, none of the pathways that we
describe are inherently wrong in themselves. Decisions to remove a
child from a school or to place them on a part-time timetable, for
example, can all be made for very rational and well-intentioned
reasons. When these decisions are taken with the best interests of
the child in mind, they may well contribute to that child accessing
education more successfully in future.”
This
sounds very much like a legal disclaimer, so that when they are
called out on their biases, they can say “oh no, we didn’t mean
you, we mean those others, over there” and point generally as they
try and create division amongst the HE community.
“However,
our research has highlighted these are the scenarios in which
children can end up missing out on their entitlement to a formal
full-time education, and in some of the scenarios described this
outcome becomes highly likely.”
You
mean your research that, either purposely or ignorantly, has avoided
any contact with actual elective home educators, yes?
Then
the document has a summary table, and goes on to describe each of
these boxes in a bit more detail.
“Children
who leave school at the instigation of the parent
There
have always been a small proportion of parents who, for a variety of
philosophical, cultural, lifestyle or religious reasons decide to
remove their children from mainstream schooling and educate them at
home, themselves. This is a right, set out in law, which parents are
free to exercise. However, there is mounting evidence that more
parents than before are choosing to take their children out of the
school in which they are enrolled and educate them at home.”
Why
is there a ‘However’ at the start of that last sentence? If it
is a fact, it is a fact, and doesn’t need to have any negative
implications associated with it.
“In
our survey, many of the 183 parents who replied had opted to take
their child out of school and educate them at home.”
This
would be much more interesting if they actually stated how many had
withdrawn their children from school. Additionally, I would want to
know whether these 183 parents are 183 individual families, or
whether there is some double-counting going on, in order to make the
research seem more legitimate and statistically accurate.
“Most[of the parents who had
withdrawn their children from school] had
done so because they were dissatisfied with the ability of the school
to meet their child’s learning needs. In the large majority of
cases this was because the parent felt that either their child’s
special educational needs or their child’s mental health needs were
not being met. Most of the parents who replied to our survey and had
taken their children out of school described situations in which they
felt that they had exhausted all other options, and this was the last
resort.”
Again,
it is important to note who they have directed these questions to -
“with the support of the National
Network for Parent Carer Forums we conducted a small scale survey of
parents and carers whose children were currently or had previously
been missing education.”
The
National Network for Parent Carer
Forums (NNPCF) state
“Our
missionis
to deliver better outcomes for families living with special
educational needs and disabilities (SEND).”
http://www.nnpcf.org.uk/
Whilst there are many home educators whose children have SEND, they
are not representative.
Other
things to pull out of the preceding paragraph – if a parent feels
that HE is a last resort, this is a huge failing of the school or
school system, and home educators should not be made to pay for this.
Also, there are plenty of people within the HE community who did
indeed pull their children out ‘as a last resort’ only to
discover what HE actually is, and wish they had never put their
children in school in the first place! Without having seen the
questionnaire (and how the questions were worded / whether there were
implicit biases in the questions) it is very difficult to objectively
do anything with this information.
Finally,
given that it is the parent’s responsibility to ensure their child
receives an education, if a parent is “dissatisfied with the
ability of the school to meet their child’s learning needs”, then
they absolutely should remove their child from that school (whether
to find a new school or home educate), and it would be neglectful not
to!
“However,
some school leaders to whom we spoke also identified lower levels of
resilience to setbacks in some families, choosing to remove their
children from school rather than work through a difficult period in
their child’s educational life.”
Can
I say Victim Blaming?!
“Several
school leaders also identified an increase in the number of parents
who decided to take their child out of mainstream schooling in order
to evade local authority action or a fine for their child’s
non-attendance or if the school raised concerns with local authority
children’s services about the well-being of a child. ... some of
those families have opted to remove their child from school rather
than face a fine or what they deem to be unwarranted state intrusion
into their family life. The children removed from full-time formal
education where the school had concerns about the child’s wellbeing
or where the child was already subject to a protection plan by
children’s social care caused the greatest anxiety for school
leaders.”
Again,
conflating two different issues, namely education and welfare.
Whenever
a child is removed from school, it is the school’s responsibility
to inform the LA, and the LA should then get in touch with the
parents. If a school has raised concerns with the LA about the
well-being of a child, and the parent then removes the child from
school, the LA should investigate. Why wouldn’t they? If there
are genuine concerns for the welfare of a child, no home educator
will get in the way.
As
for parents who remove their children from school in order to evade a
fine, it depends on the individual circumstances. Is the child
simply truanting, or school-refusing? Or is the child too young to
leave school alone, and it is the parents who are simply not taking
their children to school? Maybe the child has family abroad who are
ill, so they spend significant amounts of time travelling, and the
parents deem is more sensible to simply home educate? Or perhaps
there is some illness or disability that means the child finds it
difficult to be in school during daytime hours, and would rather be
able to sleep or rest then, and be educated in the evenings?
Again,
there is too much nuance in these situations to suggest that they all
are causes for concern.
“Children
who leave school at the instigation of the school”
This
section is all about the failure of schools. Off-rolling is not a
part of home education, and schools who off-roll pupils should be
sanctioned appropriately.
“Successfully
electively home educating a child requires dedication, preparation
and full-time commitment. A parent who removes a child from
mainstream education not through choice but under duress is unlikely
to be able to provide that child with the formal full-time education
to which they are entitled.”
I
find myself agreeing with the first sentence and disagreeing with the
second. Again, we have the problem of the word ‘formal’. Whether
a parent removes their child from school under duress or not, has
absolutely no bearing on the parent’s ability to facilitate home
education for their children – it is totally nonsensical to suggest
otherwise.
“Children
who stay in school but do not access full-time”
This
section is also about schools. It does have the sentence “The
second group of children who are missing out on a formal full-time
education, despite being on a school roll, are those on part-time
timetables” and does not
mention or account for flexischoolers, who are different to the
children being described here.
“Children
or families with poor health
A
small but very important subset of those children who remain on a
school roll but do not attend school all day or every day are those
children where either their own poor health or that of their family
members makes routine attendance impossible. … many young carers
‘remain hidden from official sight’. Nearly 15,000 children under
17 are providing more than 50 hours care a week and the Children’s
Society’s own analysis shows that around 1 in 20 young carers aged
11 to 15 miss school because of their caring responsibilities.”
I
don’t understand how a
young carer can ‘remain hidden from official sight’ if they are
on a school roll but not attending school. Surely there are
processes for schools to highlight those children that are missing
school to provide 50hrs/week care? Surely these are the people and
families that the LA should step-in and help?
“Children
who cannot be provided with a school place
The
final two pathways out of formal full-time education relate to those
children who are not on a school roll. Local authority admissions
teams maintain a list of children who are waiting for a school place.
... there are a minority of children who are very hard to place and
might remain on a waiting list for a significant period of time.”
So,
this is a failing of the LA.
“Highly
mobile children and families
Finally,
local authorities identified some children who may not be known to
services in a local area at all, and when they do become known are
often very challenging to find a school place for due to the complex
nature of their needs. Within this category are those who meet the
DfE’s legal definition of children missing education – they are
not and may never have been on a school roll and are not receiving
education in any other setting, including at home.”
Again,
I want to highlight the word ‘and’ in that final sentence. If a
child is not and has never been on a school roll, it does not
logically follow that the child is missing education.
