Do I need to de-register DS1?

[Zaftig]

He isn't at school yet but attends the nursery attached to the school. I wasn't sure if this would mean I'd have to fill in any forms or can I just not send him to school once P1 starts?

I'm in Scotland if that makes a difference?

I'm VERY new to the whole HE idea so apologise if I'm asking something that's been asked a thousand times.

I had send in a deferment form as I didn't want DS1 to start school in September anyway but now I think HE is the way forward.

Ooh I don't know about that one. I'd assume not - you just don't ask for a place - but best to check with schoolhouse, the scottish HE people.

Hi, if he is not enrolled at a state school, then you don't need to deregister him, or ask for consent to home educate. If you've already deferred, then he won't be on the school roll for August, so you don't have to do anything.

I don't know if they will write to you to offer you a school place for the following year, or if you're expected to apply for them yourself - if they do write to offer you a place, you'll have to turn it down at that stage, but you still won't need to ask consent to HE, because he has never actually been enrolled at the school or attended it.

link here to the guidelines The relevant bit is :

"Under Section 35 of the Education (Scotland) Act 1980, parents of a child who has been attending a public school [ie state school] must seek the local authority's consent before withdrawing their child from that school, and the authority must not unreasonably withhold consent. It should be noted that while consent is needed for withdrawal from school, consent is not needed to home educate in itself.

Consent is not needed in the following situations:

The child has never attended a public school....."

Even though the nursery is attached to the school, it is not itself a state school, so doesn't matter here.

HTH!

Thank you so much for that info AMIS (and for your post too ommmwardandupward!).

Oh, I thought you meant from Mumsnet! I was wondering what he'd done!

Would this be the same for the transition to secondary school. We haven't applied for a place at secondary school because we are goingt to HE DS1 when he finishes primary in July. I assume I don't have to contact the LEA, just wait and see if they notice he's not registered anywhere

Yes nettie, that's the same - I'll paste the full list from the document:

"Consent is not needed in the following situations:

The child has never attended a public school.
The child has never attended a public school in that authority's area.
The child is being withdrawn from an independent school.
The child has finished primary education in one school but has not started secondary education in another.
The school the child has been attending has closed."

They go on to say:

"Although there is no statutory duty upon parents to inform the local authority that they are home educating if they do not require consent, many authorities would prefer home educators in their area, or moving into their area, to contact them."

IME they don't want to know! We phoned the council 3 times to check if we needed to ask for consent, leaving our details each time. They didn't phone back, but on the third call they decided we didn't need consent. Two years later we haven't heard another peep from them...

Thanks. From what I've heard our LEA is quite supportive, but I'd rather not have to deal with them unless I really have too.