to think home ed families are going to have to accept more oversight?

[DrZaraCarmichael]

To try to prevent more cases like Sara Sharif. Taken out of school - where teachers were raising concerns - and then apparently fell off the radar.

Yes children's services have to look long and hard at themselves but taking a child out of school, especially when there has been previous SS involvement, has to raise a whole field of red flags surely??

I can see how families who are home educating for the right reasons and who have nothing to hide will see this as intrusive and unnecessary. But something has to change, right?

@sunshinestar1986 It was in response to another poster. HE is illegal or highly restricted in various countries. I do not think we should ban HE, but I think the current situation is far too loose.

The rationale for this in France stems from a hypothetical fear about children being radicalised (i.e. Islamophobia), and in Sweden from a perception that the child more 'belongs' to the state than the parents.

It raises issues about state control vs individual freedoms. With individual freedom comes a higher risk of the sad but rare cases such as Sara Sharif's, but with more state control children and parents may be denied the right to live as they would prefer and are denied alternatives to the ultimately arbitrary and potentially damaging choices the state makes. Where we sit on the line between control and freedom varies, but it really comes down to acceptable risks. Both sides come with risks and no system is going to solve all of the issues.

Personally I think freedom and choice is important, that the state should not control family life to the extent that people are guilty until proven innocent, and that properly funded and utilised correctly the safeguards currently in place for children balance risks and benefits adequately. Don't forget that with an overly involved state comes the risk of harm too. Who gets into those positions of considerable power and how suitable they are, risks of biases and vendettas, and risks of the process causing more harm than benefit if, for example, children were unduly taken into care.

It was interesting to read a lot of thoughtful discussions on this aspect during the proposed Scottish Named Persons scheme, where all children would have been assigned a 'professional' to basically be involved in their lives from birth. The scheme would have been a massive overreach into family life and was rightfully scrapped.

Rather than law changes I think funding services to be able to do what they are currently trying to do without staff burning out and system delays would be preferable. Overstretched services are the actual problem that needs changing.

No.

Most home edders do not stick to lesson schedules because the whole idea of home edding is to be more flexible to children's needs. Home education is not there to replicate school which doesn't work for many children.

My home educated child does not follow a lesson schedule and our target is to sit igcses next year, a year earlier than his peers at school.

A good example of why lessons schedules don't work for home ed. Two weeks ago we were learning about the Kapp Putsch together. We ended up spending an entire day on it, talking and learning about hyperinflation and what it is, trade unions and so on. If we had a scehduke to stick to, we would have stopped well before all that and plenty of valuable learning would have been lost.

Schedules can mean stopping at a point where a child is grasping a concept, showing an interest in something and can stop further learning from happening. If my son is struggling with something, we keep going with it until he gets it, whether that's an hour or a week. Sometimes we plan to do something for a week and within a day or two he's got it, so schedules are pointless and damaging.

Home education is the default. You opt into education at school, not the other way round.

And what is the spending on public education per pupil in these countries... it's pretty high, UK does not even come close. These countries have excellent state education systems, to the extent that private education is rare (unlike UK).

The reason we have unprecedented numbers of home educators in England is because our education system is such poor quality compared to these countries, due to long term underfunding.

I personally don’t agree with home education, parents shouldn’t have sole autonomy over how and what children learn, or be able to separate children from society and their peers!

I am a humanist, so not religious at all, but sending my children to school means that they are exposed to the state religion (CofE) and actually had an RE teacher in primary school who kept saying that all religions apart from Christianity were wrong!

That said my daughters need to be exposed to a full education, and not indoctrinated into my world view! (For the record I was strictly raised as a Catholic)

Home educated children are vulnerable to the complete indoctrination of their parents views, and have no opportunity to question them or evaluate them.

They are also at the mercy of their parents behaviour and again have no opportunity to gauge if their parents behaviour is normal or healthy! I saw an article in my local newspaper where a conspiracy theorist had decided to home school her children because the school supported flu vaccinations, she seemed like she herself was in need of a basic education in science and by her own admission didn’t have any formal qualifications!

I question therefore if a person like this couldn’t secure a job as a teacher in school, why should she be allowed to essentially radicalise her children without any oversight or balance?

There are already private schools if people do not agree with sending their kids to a local school, and for those of a religious nature there are all manner of religious ethos schools, or extra curricular activities run as Saturday/ Sunday schools attached to places of worship!

During lockdown I had to home school my own children and the resources and materials I had to buy were astronomical in cost, are home schooling parents required to prove that they have the correct books, and equipment to ensure educational parity with their children’s peers? I suspect not!

I agree that it’s also a huge risk in terms of safeguarding too, as there is no oversight of the child’s health and wellbeing at all!

They say it takes a whole village to raise a child, and imho this can not be done solely by parents!

Disagree. A 'tiny minority' of children like Sara shouldn't have to suffer because you have an issue with being part of society. I find there's an arrogance to any parent thinking it's fine to completely drop off the radar with their kids anyway. You may be the best parent and most qualified teacher in the world, but it's healthy for your children to have other input too.

Wow.

All of this nonsense is only a problem if there is no engagement out of the house at all, and the number of parents who do this is tiny.

Most home ed children belong to all sorts of clubs and other groups. Most home ed children see the dentist, the GP and other medical professionals for different reasons. Very, very few home ed children are not exposed to other people's opinions. As you've demonstrated, everyone has one even when they know very little about something.

@1WanderingWomble Hang on - Sara was placed with a child protection order the minute she was born due to her violent dad.

She was in school for years - the teachers knew she was being abused because of the bruising round her neck and chin. They failed to report it properly twice.

SS failed to chasing it up or look in to it despite her bring on a child protection.

The police knew of his fathers violence towards women and children

They all knew.

Then she was taken out of school and murdered.

This is fuck all to do with HE but AGAIN with systemic failure of children ALREADY known as being at risk - eventually murdered because the authorities did fuck all

But schools should have sole autonomy over what children learn?

Most children who are home educated are not separated from society or peers. We don't hide our children in little boxes, never to see anyone while we indoctrinate them. My home educated child sees a broader range of people and does more activities than his schooled peers who spend the entire day with children of the same age.

We don't have to buy any resources. The Internet and libraries are wonderful things and are free. We take our child to see religious buildings and enjoy meals and talk to the people there, we do volunteering.

We also have a village because, again, home educators aren't little trolls in a box that don't see anyone. We have friends, we have families, we have groups, sports clubs etc.

Who would over see it? There is a massive shortage of social workers.

I think that the main way society needs to tackle this problem is to deal with the root cause.
Why are so many men so violent towards women, children and animals and how can this be stopped?

But who is actually making sure that children are mixing with their peers and exposed to people of different religions, cultures, and socioeconomic backgrounds?

Unless you are going to lock away your children forever you are just delaying their development!

Finally do you know how many home schooled children make it to university? How many GCSEs and A-levels?

Without formal qualifications a child’s long term future could be far more challenging, and many careers are obviously going to be closed to them!

Given that education is a human right, how can we accept that unqualified people are being allowed to teach children without any oversight and seperate them from society?

At least during Covid lockdown we had to send completed work to my daughters teachers each afternoon to prove that we were educating them (my husband and I were working full time from home so we had to tag team based on subject).

How can it be that no one is checking if children are completing a full curriculum each day, week, month, academic year?

No it isn't

@envbeckyc Of the young adults who have completed home ed I can currently think of off the top of my head: one is working for a homeless charity, five are at university, one started uni, didn't like the course, took a year out, and is going back next year to do something else, one is at Bible mission college, one has just finished nursing training, one is at vet school, and one is currently working at a café before whatever she is doing next. (She told me but I have forgotten. I think it's nursing college.)

Pretty similar to the young adults I know who have recently completed high school.

How can you home educate without a classroom of resources?

Books from the library are one thing and may be helpful with basic reading, but what about comprehension, science, maths, art, history,PE etc…

During lockdown I had to buy lots of materials and equipment to make sure my children were keeping up! Yes there is twinkle but I had to buy a microscope, circuits, PE equipment and even cams to name but a few things. I drew the line at a pottery wheel though!

Do you allow your children to take SATs assessments to check that that they are actually keeping pace with their peers and are you planning to teach them and enter them for enough GVSEs to achieve baccalaureate?

Primary school education has massively evolved since I was as school, the terminology and skills to teach it have also changed substantially!

I honestly feel that a suitably qualified and assessed teacher and support staff are absolutely required to educate children.

Would you get a book from a library and have a go at a bit of home surgery because you fancied giving it a go?

EXACTLY. It’s nothing to do with HE and everything to do with poorly funding public sector services and inadequate safeguarding for a child already known to SS.

envbeckyc you might be surprised to learn lots of children fail at school. My daughter failed her year 6 sats when she was at school and got mainly 1s and 2s in her end of year 7 school report. At least I am able to go back and fill in lots of the blanks for her. Many school children fail their GCSE's.

Also I have met parents of children who have never been at school who have had a wonderful varied education, clocking up a number of GCSE's and other qualifications before school children have sat theirs. Of course other parents no doubt do a less than stellar job of it, but rather than assuming you are right and they are wrong, it maybe worth thinking about why they have made this difficult decision. While some are, the majority of parents are not feckless and do want the best for their children.

This is such a blinkered perspective.
Do you really think Home- Educated children never meet anyone from different cultures, socio-economic or religious backgrounds? Where do you get this idea from?

Surely - just a simple trip to the park should show you - you are bound to meet and interact with different people the moment you step out of your home.

Not to mention, libraries or meet ups, clubs, friends etc.

Why would they not get qualifications? Many Home Educated take their GCSE’s early. Or select the ones they want - so they can focus on their interests.

I find it amazing how many people think there is one way to approach education.

What’s interesting, is the amount of children that leave state school without the required GCSE’s results in English and Maths. It’s shocking.

Under the current system without proper oversight, what happens to the children with feckless parents?

Do we just hope that they don’t get murdered?

And the number of primary school leavers who cannot read!

What feckless parents are going to home educate them? Seriously, if they don’t like the kids enough to raise them properly they’re not going to willingly have them around all the time. Unless they’re entirely off the radar, they’ll have the HV until they go to school as well as the GP, nursery/pre school staff for a start.

Years ago I was a specialist social worker employed (by a forward thinking council) to assess and assist parents who home educated. Parents were offered an initial social work assessment by me and a curriculum assessment by an education advisor. I had to interview children and obtain their views on their situation, experiences of home education, hobbies, sporting and social activities, friendships as well as assessing their general welfare and home environment. If I identified any child protection concerns these were escalated to the safeguarding team. I had also had powers to apply for a court order requiring parents to enrol their child at a school identified by me. These powers still exist but the job I did does not. These roles need to be resurrected across the country with a change in the law to make the assessments compulsory not voluntary.
Traditionally, elective home education was chosen by parents who resisted any attempts at state involvement in their lives. The resistors were often well educated in their rights and the law and would refuse any involvement, others were desperate for any support and welcomed us. It's these resistors that have for years successfully lobbied against any state involvement and I see some of them have been commenting here. To those people I want to ask them if a compulsory visit from me once a year is really such an imposition when it could potentially save a child's life or stop them being further abused (and it has).

This

I’ve always home educated DDs 16 & 14. I had my first ‘assessment’ last week … I live in Ireland where it’s mandatory. In the UK there is no requirement to register.