Schools expelling students?

[Enigma007]

DH came home yesterday and mentioned that one of his work colleague is stuck in a red list country with his wife and 2 children. He can't return home because the hotel quarantine cost is too much.
Both children were attending full time school, year 8 and year 5. The school has emailed him saying they will take the children off the school register.

The children haven't been in school since end of march (when schools reopened) and when the country was placed on the red list, ticket prices were sky high and hard to get hold of. Is the school allowed to remove the children from the register? It feels a bit unfair because he's not stuck there by choice.

Before everyone starts bashing him saying he shouldn't have gone unless it was a reason allowed by the border force, he did leave the UK under the criteria set by the border force and had the evidence with him incase he had to prove it.

They may well no longer be eligible to claim child benefit, for example, and face complicated tax arrangements having been out of the country for such a long time. Presumably the schools have a waiting list and can reoffer the spaces.

Look at it the other way round OP. How long do you think is reasonable for a school to keep a pupil’s place open when they’re not there?

Irrespective of the reason for travel though they knew they where taking a risk by going, they knew they where taking a risk by taking the whole family. Everyone has had to make shitty decisions over the last year it’s horrible but it’s been life.

They could have found a way back between February and now but they haven’t. School shouldn’t be berated for wanting pupils to actually attend

Schools can off roll after a much shorter period than these children have missed. If he has a steady job and income, he can get a loan or similar to cover the cost of the hotel quarantine. I sympathise with the reasons for travel in the first place, but sounds to me like he thought he’d just wait it out till it got a bit cheaper to get home and is now paying the price. Well, his kids are.

@FlorenceWintle

Look at it the other way round OP. How long do you think is reasonable for a school to keep a pupil’s place open when they’re not there?

This is how you should be looking at the situation. The children are taking up places which could be given to others for an unspecified amount of time, of course the school would be looking to take them off role. Realistically it is likely to be September before they return to school.

In all honesty he should have been looking to priotise his childrens education and there is no reason they couldn't have returned in March.

@Enigma007

He has a steady job as he's wfh so income isn't and issue for them to maintain living costs. Just asked dh why he left the UK in the 1st place. He said his father in law was terminal and given a month to live. He passed away in feb some time.

If you like I can ask the specific dates so we can make sure he can pin him and bash him on some small minute detail that we may or may not know about.

But you don’t seem to know a great deal but seem to think it unfair . You don’t have any idea when they will return but you think the school should keep the place open for them . Priorities all wrong op I lack sympathy they are wfh and quite happy with the arrangement and don’t want to pay for a quarantine hotel . But now they’ve been told will loose school place probably because they can’t give a date when they come back .

@Sirzy

Irrespective of the reason for travel though they knew they where taking a risk by going, they knew they where taking a risk by taking the whole family. Everyone has had to make shitty decisions over the last year it’s horrible but it’s been life.

They could have found a way back between February and now but they haven’t. School shouldn’t be berated for wanting pupils to actually attend

I wasn't berating, I was just asking if this is allowed (given the current circumstances around covid) and what they can do to prevent the children being taken off the register, but it seems the school is well within its rights to off roll the children.

In my area most schools are over-subscribed with a waiting list (20 out of 22) so the places would be unlikely to be there when they come back. If they haven’t got a date to come back the schools can’t keep places open indefinitely.

Best way to prevent them being off rolled is to get them back home and to school!

Besides anything else, how can they not afford the hotel quarantine but can afford to stay in a foreign country for months on end?

@Sirzy

Best way to prevent them being off rolled is to get them back home and to school!

In this situation this is the only way the parents would be able to prevent being off rolled in all the schools I've worked in.

His poor kids are being totally let down.

Yes, it is called off rolling. If you were a parent on the waiting list for that school, there comes a point when it is more advantageous for the place to be given to you rather than held indefinitely. The cost of returning home unfortunately isn't the schools fault. Other people have been able to return and quarantine so I think the school has been more than fair. Your friend will need to look at enrolling in a local school or returning and reapplying for a school place in this country after quarantine.

@LeSquigh

Besides anything else, how can they not afford the hotel quarantine but can afford to stay in a foreign country for months on end?

Presumably they are living with family if that is who they were visiting.

he's not from India or Pakistan so let's get off that band wagon before we start bashing that community.

I can ask the specific dates so we can make sure he can pin him and bash him on some small minute detail that we may or may not know about.

I'm assuming this thread is actually about you, OP? If not then your defensiveness is really odd.

You asked the question about why the children will be 'expelled'. People are just explaining that no school is allowed to keep a place for kids who have been abroad for 6 months and aren't coming back.

They are also pointing out that going abroad for so long is a choice with obvious consequences, not something done to someone.

Looking at the Education Act here
[[http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2006/1751/regulation/8/made]{

the only section which is remotely relevant is that a child's name can be removed from the roll on the grounds:

"(h)that he has been continuously absent from the school for a period of not less than twenty school days and —
(i)at no time was his absence during that period authorised by the proprietor in accordance with regulation 6(2);
(ii)the proprietor does not have reasonable grounds to believe that the pupil is unable to attend the school by reason of sickness or any unavoidable cause; and
(iii)both the proprietor of the school and the local education authority have failed, after reasonable enquiry, to ascertain where the pupil is

OP, if your husband’s colleague wants to try to argue against it, they could potentially argue against the ‘unavoidable cause’ (although they are way outside the 20 days which is the clincher really) but even on that, there have been plenty of chances between last December to come back and they did choose to extend their tickets, so the education authority could easily refute this.

I’m afraid, against the other conditions, your husband’s colleague really cannot fight against them reasonably.

Maybe he can re-enrol them if the place doesn't get filled?

Or he can speak to the school or council about getting them re admitted under the fair access scheme?

It may be worth him writing to the council and appealing with regards to his circumstances and make the school keep the place open, but as PP said, if there are other children waiting then it's only fair that their children's' place isn't wasted.

So presumably the children are living with family over there, of the Dad can afford to pay his rent/mortgage whatever in this country and presumably contribute in some way to his and his children's keep in the other country then I'm pretty sure he can cobble together the money for the quarantine, I wouldn't be suprised if the government has some sort of payment plan for things like this. If he arrives at the airport and cant pay up front for the quarantine I find it unlikely they would just send the British Citizens back to a foreign country.

What kind of education are the children getting where they are? If they're at a local school I assume they can't be on the register for both. And if not, don't they need to be back at school as a priority (unless they're both 4!)

Does the colleague have a partner, surely they and the children could have come home earlier and the colleague stay with his ill father.

I’m sure I remember a similar thread a few weeks ago about children missing months off school as in another country.

I think there are also tax implications of WFH in another country.

Agree with everyone else that "expelled" is the wrong terminology here. They have been removed from the school role as they haven't been in the country for 6 months and have little prospect of returning.

What exactly do you expect the school to do in this situation? In the colleague's position I'd be putting the children into local schools wherever they are, trying to get back to the UK asap and crossing my fingers that there was still a space.

It's up to the school- many academies can off-roll you if you miss 21 days, so they're well over that. That said, my own school had children stuck abroad since January and we just continued doing lessons inline alfrom the classroom (so class was in and broadcast through our online system so those self isolating at home or those abroad could just join every lesson. DD's school had children joining classes from abroad too- the boy stuck in India was joining lessons at gone 8pm poor thing.
No-one was off-rolles in either, but schools vary hugely.

Yes. That is off-roll due to non attendance. They could return, just haven't, and therefore will lose their places.

The Children haven't attended since March so haven't been attending full time at all. Sad that his father was terminal but you don't take your kids out of school for 3 months because of it.
They'll just have to chalk this one up to one of life's lessons or get their bums home and pay the inflated cost of quarantine and testing 🤷‍♀️

Global pandemics and travel restrictions doesn't mean you can do what you like and ignore the rules 🤷‍♀️

Schools are judged by their attendance records and most schools are over subscribed. It’s not surprising it happened.

A primary near me had an ongoing issue with children going to Pakistan/India so they follow the you’re out if you don’t attend rule (I can’t remember how long but I know they shortened it). They are rated Outstanding by OFSTED but poor attendance would ruin that.

It seems to be even longer than that they've been out of the country @andivfmakes3. OP says they left in December but because nobody was in school between December and March, nobody was particularly bothered where they were doing their online schooling from.