How to de-register a child from school (England and Wales)

[Julienoshoes]

A thread for bumping up, for information, so we don't have to keep repeating ourselves.

You'll find a sample de-registration letter (England and Wales) and other information about the realities and legalities of home education on the Education Otherwise and Home Education UKwebsites.

It is recommended that you get a receipt for the letter.

You are not obliged to have any further contact with the school once they have received this letter.
You are not obliged to contact the LA yourself at all, that is the school's responsibility.

Note that if you were already being pursued for truancy, that offence still stands but your child cannot be a truant if they are not a registered pupil. If you are providing an education under s7 of the Education Act 1996 by the time it gets to court, you may be fined for the earlier truancy but it seems unlikely a court would order a parent to prison.

For information about home education in Scotland contact Schoolhouse

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when you send your de registration letter do you give a date of when they will leave school? Can it essentially be when you say? Thank you :)

Yes, you can choose the date, and it can be whenever you want. In the deregistration letter, it would be a good idea to tell the school when your child's last day at school will be. Or if your child isn't coming back, say "with immediate effect".

Thank you. Very helpful.

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I'm wanting to take me son out of school and home school until I can have him transferred to another school . I've filled in forms for transfer but now have to wait and have been told by council can take at least 15 school working days and I will be prosecuted if have him out of school for more than 10 school working days .
Can I deregister him just from his current school while I await transfer?
I would home school while waiting ?

Hi Kerry, yes you can do this. It will not affect your son's eligibility for a place in the new school. Just make sure everyone understands the plan, so the council won't assume you have changed your mind about wanting the school place. They shouldn't make that assumption, but they might. When you send the dereg letter to the school, you could copy it to the LA and enclose a covering note saying that you only intend to HE temporarily and you do want the place at the new school.

There is no minimum time for home educating. There is also no set curriculum and no fixed number of hours for education.

As it is only for a few weeks, you could just use this time for whatever you feel your son needs right now. If he has had a rough time at his current school then he might benefit from a break from anything that looks like school. If you'd rather do some formal work, you could just get a couple of workbooks and do a bit of maths and reading every day, or a project on a topic of his choice, or visit some museums. There are lots of options and no "wrong" way to do it.

Hello my daughter has been badly bullied and its got to the point where its started to get nasty with other parents I had a really nasty letter from the head teacher over allegations that are to do with a member of staff and face book Its that bad my daughter cant go to school without parents or staff speaking about her and i really want to pull her out but dont want school to cause me trouble im at my witts end and my daughter is currently signed out by her doctor who has signed her off till next week with anxiety due to bullying, The school also failed to inform me she wasn`t eating when she was saying she was packed lunch when she was meant to be school dinners and has lost weight ect any other mums in my shoes id gladly appreciate your help!

Well, if you are in England/Wales, you can just follow the instructions in this thread and send the right sort of letter in, instead of her, and then you are in charge of her education from that point onwards.

Best to start your own discussion within the Home Ed topic (you're in the right topic, but this thread is so general that you probably won't get much advice on it - people won't bother to click on it. So start a new discussion with a title that shows what kind of advice you are looking for, and we'll all be straight along to help!)

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Downloaded the letter and going to send it in tomorrow. Nervous and excited at the same time. I want this year to be a new start of so many things for us!

I am thinking of deregistering my 11 year old from junior school he is in year 6, not done his SATS yet, but he has been accepted at his high school in September, which, I want him to attend. If I deregister himfrom his junior school will this affect the place he has been offered at his high school, they are both the same LEA

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Hi,

Is the advice at the top of this thread still valid?

When I go to my local authority's website it says:

"If you elect to home educate you can register your child/children with the council.

You can do this by completing our online registration eform and Statement of Provision eform"

This seems different from what is being suggested above.

In my case, what I am now (quite seriously) planning to do is de-register DD from her school, home school her for a year, and then, hopefully, put her back into her current school, but in the year below (ie going into Year 9 in 2020, rather than 2019).

DD is a summer baby, and to be quite honest, should have been held back right at the beginning - but in those days we were told the LEA would not allow out of year. Now of course, after all the research on how summer babies never really catch up, they are reasonably accommodating, and coming up to GCSEs, I really think she would benefit from a year out, broadening her education, before starting on the (three year) GCSE at her current school.

I have spoken to the admissions person, and she is reasonably sympathetic, subject to them having a place (which she cannot guarantee, there is a waiting list currently for the current Year 7, but it may have moved by September 2020, when I want it). Head of Year agrees that she is "just a kid" by comparison with her peers. Headmaster is worried about the "school holiday effect", but I said I would try and make sure she maintains her maths, science and English, which I think is what they are worried about.

However I am still trying to get my head around the logistics (if/when I send a letter to the school, which presumably should be around July this year (?) I want to explain that I actually will be hoping for a place in a year. Not that I gather it will help if they don't actually have one, but maybe she will keep it in her mind at least (not sure what they does, but anyway).

But what are the requirements with all of these on-line forms that the LEA seems to require one to fill in - and what do they ask you (I don't want to fill them in yet, as I want her to finish Year 8)?

You don't need to fill in the LEAs forms or register with them. You send a deregistration letter to the school and the school informs the LEA.
The procedure is the same however long you intend to home educate. They won't be able to keep in mind you want her to go back, they have admission procedures and you will need to apply again for a place and be subject to same rules as anyone who moved to the area or asks to transfer school. Have you thought what you will do if you don't get a place at preferred school for GCSEs?

Have thought about what if we don't get a place back at the current school, and there are a couple of other schools in the area that might do, although less ideal. There is also a private school, which would probably take her, and they have a two year GCSE, so I might be tempted to home school her for another year (what is really her Year 9), in the hope that at least one of the three schools come up, and if not, maybe we can afford two years in the private school.
It is not the ideal scenario though, I would really like to put her back in her current school - but I just can't put her forward for GCSEs, she is just not ready. I have have a DS who is finishing off GCSEs at the moment, and there is no way she is ready to cope with this. School are willing to try and drop her next year, but they do the same projects and the same worksheets year after year (I know, I saw with DS), and it would be mad to ask her to do the same geography projects etc again - when there are broadening things that she and I really want to do (we have plans for a one year GCSE in photography that we have found, that would be perfect - she is passionate about photography, it is not offered in her current school, and it is four hours a week of teaching - and would give her a taste of what is coming in a subject she actually wants to study, and hopefully help her develop the maturity, while focussing on just the one subject)