What does your LA do for you?

[SianiMoomin]

Hi, hope you don't mind me posting here. I am a new EHE officer and really want to overhaul local policy and build a relationship with our local EHE families.

What are the best things your LA offers you? What would you like your LA to do for you that they currently don't?

Thank you for your help :)

In twelve years, my LA has done two things for me. They provided a letter stating that my teen was home educated so that I could get an educational discount on an expensive subscription to an online art suite. They also forwarded to me details of a local college's open day. (I'd already learned about that through the home ed grapevine but still I appreciate the thought.)

In unrelated incidents, two of my friends have been helped in a major way by the LA EHE staff who rebuffed the attempts of clueless social workers to force their autistic children back to school after school had damaged their mental health badly.

The main additional thing I've always wanted from them is for them to signpost new home ed families toward the huge supportive network of other HE families on their doorstep. It's a key resource for us, and IMO is often of greatest use to families at the moment when they start HE. I believe the LA hasn't wanted to do this in the past because they've found that when we talk to each other, we may suggest to each other that it isn't always necessary to comply with all of the LA's preferred procedures (e.g. universal annual home visits). They've been "reminded" several times a year for at least ten years that we'd like this contact information placed into the leaflet they give home educators. Somehow they "haven't got around to" doing so... until last year! So that's progress.

Ha!

Without being rude, I don't think the majority of home ed families are too bothered about building a relationship with their LA! I know we aren't.
I wouldn't want to invest in this if there is nothing for the family to gain from it.
What do we need? Financial help with GCSE fees would be very useful. I've heard of a couple of LA's offering this, but only at year 11 equivalent school year age. Many home ed teens take some earlier than this, so why the age condition?
We would also have appreciated funding for dyslexia assessment, rather than paying the £500 ourselves. Local children who attend a secondary school get this funded. We couldn't.

Thanks for sharing your experiences, that's really food for thought.

The main additional thing I've always wanted from them is for them to signpost new home ed families toward the huge supportive network of other HE families on their doorstep

Saracen I've now got an arrangement in place for my LA's EHE officer to point new home educators towards me, then I link them to the local FB groups, the 2007 Guidelines (so they have the real legislation, not just what the LA chooses to give them), EdYourself and any other relevant info like SEN groups or exam info. It works well - new home edders get the networking and info they need, but the LA is kept at arm's length .