To think Home Education should be made illegal

[Viviennemary]

I would like to see a ban on HE except perhaps in a very very few cases and with good reason and under strict supervision.

A large reason that parents HE is because their children don't have an ECHP so can't specify placement or that school don't apply EHCP even when the child has one, sharing their 1:1 etc or there is no appropriate setting.

Increased surveillance will not help DC or parents and will likely piss them off - there was no funding to assess and deliver support in school but now your child has been forced out with no support and you have been forced to quit your job we can afford to surveil you!

Address SEN provision and target resources appropriately.

SS absolutely failed her. So sad.

On the other hand though, there was that poor little boy Arthur (I feel terrible I can’t remember his full name), who was starved and beaten. School staff had reported him stealing food from bins at school and told his parents - how a massive red flag like that can be missed, just informing parents and taking it no further is absolutely beyond me.

So children are abused with teachers seeing them everyday. home ed is the red herring in the case of Sarah, but it’s a handy way of further demonising it.

I am very critical of home educating having done it and seen shit home ed parents first hand, but that poor child wasn’t murdered because she was home educated. She was let down by social services and the court system.

I gave up a software engineering career to home educate, my wife works. We had moved to a country where she spoke the language and i didn't.

Well, I don't disagree with anything you've said. I suppose my point is that primary rightly emphasises maths and English as the fundamental building blocks for everything that follows. Before you can do any physics, really, you need to know a bit of algebra, and before you can read a physics textbook you probably need to have a reading age of about 14. If kids emerge from primary with solid reading and maths skills they're still young enough to be taught science, and preferably by subject specialists rather than a primary teacher whose highest qualification in a science might be a C at GCSE.
A good example that supports your arguments about the societal impact of scientific illiteracy was the frustration expressed by Patrick Vallance in the COVID enquiry about the difficulties of explaining the science of epidemics and vaccinations to a prime minister who had discontinued the study of science at the age of 15, and did not have the intellectual equipment to understand what he was being told.

No child should be able to fall through the net.

when concerns are raised there should be a system where they are properly acted upon and responded to in a joint up manner.

if I child isn’t seen by someone on an approved list (and staff in HE groups could easily be on that list) then a spot visit should be carried out to check upon the wellbeing of everyone.

the common factor in so many of these stories is when red flags are raised there isn’t a way of bringing them together to protect the vulnerable.

f I child isn’t seen by someone on an approved list (and staff in HE groups could easily be on that list) then a spot visit should be carried out to check upon the wellbeing of everyone.

"staff in HE groups" ....I don't think you know a lot about HE

Completely agree with this.

Also, teachers have studied and have degrees in teaching. The normal families who HE don't. They are under qualified to be doing a professionals job IMO.

But there does need to be much more in place for SEND, for sure. As PP said, far too many traumatised kids.

You do realise that HE groups are mostly run by HE parents, not "staff"?

Also, with regard to reports and monitoring, I am still part of some home ed facebook groups as I briefly considered it for my youngest last year.

All I see is parents who have begrudgingly sent in a report, after fighting it, getting angry that the LA have asked for samples of work to be sent in. My god, the outrage, and the advice to send back emails refusing. Other than, “it’s my child’s intellectual property and they don’t consent”, they can’t say why they are so against it.

Would it kill them to photocopy a couple of pages of written work and maths to shut everyone up?

Honestly, I used to invite them round once a year as I couldn’t be arsed writing a report. It was far easier for ds to chew their ear off about a science project or a paper mache jungle he’d made, show them a couple of English and maths workbooks. English? Tick. maths? Tick. Art and design - oh, how wonderful - tick.

Local authorities get heavy handed becuase if you can’t just fill in a form and take a couple of photos of a story your child has written without hysterics, what are they supposed to do? It ends up with eveyone at loggerheads for nothing.

And if you can’t show them anything, as your ten year old can’t write (obviously barring any SEN which would be documented), then you have serious issues with the education you are providing.

It seems that a lot of people let this little girl down 😞

I do, but I also know that many are run by organisations who offer HE sessions, or companies who offer some form of tutoring.

To help with the “eyes on” needed to help ensure children don’t fall through the net a register of those could be made with the provisio that safeguarding measures were in place and concerns reported.

my point being is in order to protect children there needs to be a joined up system whereby if a child isn’t seen then action is taken to ensure their safety.

But you can’t force parents to take their children. There would be no way of enforcing it.

@Sirzy anyone employed should already support any safeguarding concerns they have.

I did HE for a time at primary level - mainly because school concentrated on making sure everyone was average and I wanted DC to learn. We went to various HE trips to museums etc and the people we met were all very nice and caring.
Yet another knee jerk reaction to something terrible.
Perhaps more funding for social services and education authorities to give support and governance to HE families when necessary

What kind of safeguarding training would those "eyes" be required to have? Or do you think that anyone that is a tutor or work for an organisation is qualified in spotting abuse?

I’m a teacher and thought this at the start of my career. Now I see how many children are struggling because they are not given the adequate support for either their SEND needs or their mental health- both of which have been chronically under funded for years. Our children have been so let down by the education system that can’t provide for them. Schools don’t have enough money or staff to properly look after everyone- why should the children suffer?
Absolutely yes to a register and yes to a home based curriculum. All children should have the highest quality education possible and should be visible to services for safeguarding. But they also deserve to be in a setting that allows them to thrive.

All I see is parents who have begrudgingly sent in a report, after fighting it, getting angry that the LA have asked for samples of work to be sent in. My god, the outrage, and the advice to send back emails refusing. Other than, “it’s my child’s intellectual property and they don’t consent”, they can’t say why they are so against it.
Would it kill them to photocopy a couple of pages of written work and maths to shut everyone up?

Parents react like this because the LAs that ask for this are acting outside of the law. They have no right to ask for samples.

My husband works.

I work on a freelance basis so set up computer next to my son and work side by side.

And you know this how exactly? By being a fly in the house of those children?

Except Finland haven't done that. Private schools exist but they can't make a profit ie non profit making organisations. Same as any schools which are charities in UK.

I know it is. And yes, that’s shit, how terrible. But my view was always, I’m not Robin Hood. I’m not here to fight for the world, let’s just shut people up. life’s too short to fight over a photo of some writing to be honest.

How strange. None of the home educating families in my town are very well off, or have a parent that has given up work.

Home education has no impact on benefits by the way, you aren't excused from any work requirements. She receives the same benefits she would if her child was at school.

I always worry about secondary science. It needs equipment and space for that equipment, and substances which are tricky to source and need care in use. You can't just walk into a chemist and buy hydrochloric acid - I know, I tried when I was at college - and most homes aren't equipped with a fume cupboard. The OU provided me with a well equipped box of stuff for Science 101, and a business could be set up to provide that sort of thing for HE, but could the parents be trained to use it safely.
And I suspect some HE parents want to actively avoid science and its implications anyway.

Because this is what their parents have told me!!