Please sign our flexischooling petition!

[flexischoolingUK]

Flexischooling is an arrangement where a child of compulsory school age is registered at school full time, but the school agrees the child can be educated at home for part of the week. Flexischooling is a full time education, just like full time school or full time home education. This is a legal option in England, Scotland and Wales, but isn’t very well known (even in schools).

In England and Wales, flexischooling, if agreed, is marked as Code C, authorised absence. The trouble with this is that code C still
affects the school’s attendance data, which can put schools off agreeing. Before 2019, Code B (educated offsite) was allowed and this code did not negatively impact attendance data.

In December 2024, the head of Ofsted, Sir Martyn Oliver, voiced the concern in his end of year report, that we have no way of knowing how many children are being flexischooled, as Code C is a generic authorised absence code, and it is impossible to differentiate between flexischooling absences and other authorised absences.

The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill proposes that flexischooling be managed by LAs. This seems like an inefficient and costly duplication of oversight and data retention, as flexischooling children are already registered at school full time, seen in school on a weekly basis, and schools are already recording attendance of flexischooling pupils on a twice daily basis!

We believe our proposal makes more sense logistically and financially. For schools to continue to manage flexischooling arrangements, but for a specific flexischooling code to be used (Code F) giving the government quantifiable data on the number of flexischooling children. Ideally, this code would not impact attendance data, as flexischooling pupils are legally receiving a full time education and it seems unnecessary for schools to be penalised for agreeing to a flexischooling arrangement in the best interests of a child. This is the current system in Scotland, flexischooling has no negative impact on attendance data.

We are aiming to reach 10,000 signatures to get a response from the government, but more than 10,000 would be a fantastic testament to the interest in flexischooling. We currently have at least 1 signature in all but 5 constituencies in the whole of the UK! It would be absolutely amazing to be able to say that every constituency in the UK had signed.

We are currently missing a signature in Nah-Eileanan an lar in Scotland, and 4 constituencies in Northern Ireland:

Mid Ulster - Mr Cathal Mallaghan MP

East Antrim - Rt Hon Sammy Wilson MP

Lagan Valley - Sorcha Eastwood MP

Belfast West - Paul Maskey MP

Whilst this petition isn’t directly aimed at Northern Ireland, Scotland or Wales, signatures from these countries do count and the petition data will be available even after the petition ends, and could be used to demonstrate the high levels of interest in flexischooling in these countries.

And of course, if every single constituency signs, that’s a statement everyone in the UK can use, that this petition demonstrates the universal support for flexischooling in the UK, with every single constituency having signed! 🤞

Please consider taking 2 minutes to sign and verify your email (please check your junk/spam folder) as unverified emails do not count.

Thank you!

Happy to answer any question regarding flexischooling 🙂

Flexischooling petition link

Thinking about it, I did similar - albeit your story is far more impressive!

I attended school fine but my school was dire. 5% got English and maths at c or above! We were always within the bottom 5 schools in England by attainment.

What it meant was I simply wasn't taught enough in school to do well despite attending. If I was going to do wellThroughout year 10 and 11 I'd go to the school library daily after school from 3:15 to 5ish and I'd teach myself. With no help from teachers, I had to independently research the curriculum, exam topics etc, and then fill in the (large!) gaps in what we'd been taught. I'd then go home, have dinner and start on my homework.

I came top in my year with A's and A*s (save for German). It made life easier for me at degree and postgraduate because I had done so much independent learning at a young age.

This is why a timetable would be carefully planned with the headteacher to minimise disruption. Arranging for children to be learning in school for certain lessons, and which subjects parents would cover at home.

That’s so true, so much easier to learn independently later on when you’re used to having to teach yourself! I’d never even thought of that aspect of it but it is definitely true in my case also.

Well done to you. It took a lot to work your way out of a failing school, especially back then when there was no support at all and no system in place to help anybody who couldn’t deal with it. Your case and mine (and I’m sure many others like them… a couple of others in my family alone!) prove it can be done even without any formal agreement and with no oversight or help, for certain types of kids for which school just doesn’t work but are highly motivated to learn.

With an actual agreement and even a minimal amount of oversight and information on the curriculum from school and decent communication between school and home I’m sure that for the children for whom this type of arrangement is appropriate it could work extremely well.

Flexischooling is agreed at the headteacher’s discretion. In the vast majority of cases, there may only be 1 or 2 flexischooling pupils at a school. In those schools that have a higher percentage of flexischooling pupils, the timetable is designed so that flexischooling is only agreed at specific times, e.g all flexischooling pupils are learning at home on Fridays, as opposed to children being educated out of school on a variety of days.

Flexischooling arrangements are drawn up between the headteacher and the parents. In England and Wales, the headteacher is the decision maker. In Scotland, the LA has the final say.

I have not read the full thread.

It seems to be something that could work, but not for everyone, and does it end up not helping those who need it most?

Just giving an example here if we flexed on Fridays (we don't, not for the whole day anyway).

They alternate Fridays

Week 1: forest school in morning, reward time and then all school assembly in afternoon.

Week 2: pe, maths, art, phonics in morning, reward time and then all school assembly in afternoon.

It's really not hard to make sure missing those subjects doesn't cause gaps in knowledge.

This isn't a school that generally flexis though. If it was, there'd likely be no scheduled phonics or maths on Fridays if that was a Flexi day.

This assumption does not accurately reflect the reality of flexischooling arrangements. I wonder if you mistakenly imagine flexischooling to be like the remote learning from lockdown?

None of the scenarios you have imagined would be acceptable or permitted as part of a flexischooling arrangement. Flexischooling is a full time education, not a day ‘off’ and if children were not being educated on the agreed days, then the arrangement would end.

Schools are not providing planning for parents to deliver, as they did during lockdown, it is a very different arrangement.

Flexischooling is not an ad hoc arrangement. Schools are fully in control over the days and times of when flexischooling is agreed, allowing for appropriate planning to minimise disruption. For example, flexischooling is most commonly agreed at the end of the week, rather than Mondays and Tuesdays as you’ve suggested in your example.

I would hope that schools have a more effective model when planning home economics lessons, as expecting different pupils to bring different ingredients sounds like a recipe for trouble, as any child could be off sick. At least with flexischooling arrangements, the absences are expected and can be planned for.

Exactly! Smaller class sizes whilst some children are being flexischooled, allows the teacher to give more time and attention to the other pupils in class. The flexischooled pupils get 1-1 support from a parent. Everybody benefits from more individual support from an adult, so a win-win all round!

English and Maths are taught all morning each day though. It's those lessons that would have the most disturbance in terms of continuity. If you're planning a piece of writing, they need to build on that each day.

Schools have a duty of care and responsibility towards all children registered at their school.

Parents have a duty of care and responsibility towards their own children. It is not for parents to be dictating how other parents raise their children.

Parents have a legal responsibility to ensure that their child if compulsory school age is receiving a suitable full time education. There is no law that this must be by the child attending school full time. In fact, Elective Home Education is the default. Parents must apply to register their children at school, they must opt in.

We each have the right to decide how we ensure our children receive a suitable full time education whilst they are of compulsory school age.

We are all individuals, with different strengths and different abilities. A one size fits all model rarely allows all children to reach their full potential. There is a wide variety of education models for parents to choose from, whether that is full time school in a state school, sending children to an independent school (whether Steiner, Montessori, boarding or not, etc), full time home education (whether home based, world schooling, unschooling, etc), SEN children in mainstream school with various forms of support and provision, SEN children attending special schools, or an alternative provision for part of the week, EOTAS - education funded out of school by the LA.

All children should by law have access to a suitable full time education that meets their age, ability, aptitude and any special needs. All children are different, and this is part of the challenge teachers face - providing differentiated learning experiences for all children when teaching a class of 30. If a child with SEN is getting their needs met by having two afternoons of flexischooling a week, this reduces the pressure on the teacher, allowing them to give more to all the other children.

Is it? If a child is already ahead in maths and reading/ phonics you can just give the parent a vague idea of how far they have progressed already and anything specific to focus on (likely for many children doing this they’d already be ahead of the class learning, anyway) and in terms of PE and forest school children may already be having plenty of outside/ sports activities as extra-curriculars (for my children, they often end up missing these beneficial activities because they have to be arranged for after 6 hours of school and they’re already burned out but could actually attend them regularly if they were during the school day).

Children in this time could easily cover your academic class learning much more quickly with 1:1 teaching at home, save the large amount of the time that you state is spent on “rewards” or “assemblies” and instead of useless school PE that involves hardly any worthwhile exercise be doing running or tennis tuition etc. And then instead of “forest school” on a school field in a group of 30 actually be out in nature. My daughter learned properly how to make a shelter, light a fire using flints etc during her three months she couldn’t attend school. I doubt you teach them that. As for art, nobody can stop her but she’s certainly not learned any of her art skills at school in a busy, noisy environment with 30 children where she usually has to leave the room because they’re all shouting. She goes to a wonderful art class with a proper artist in a studio with nice calm music playing and three children there and draws pictures like a child twice her age.

Please explain what part of her learning would be improved by attending Fridays at your school rather than doing the above and being more emotionally regulated and calm and not having her mental health trashed by spending more of her waking hours during term time in a room for of over 30 people when it is documented that she cannot cope with this, if I could facilitate the alternative I’ve set out instead? If there were two adults in our household, not one, then I could easily do this for one or two days per week and it would teach her FAR more than school and make her much happier generally and much more able to cope on the days she IS forced to go. Please explain what learning you think she’s miss out on?

Most I would say. I worked as a private tutor for years and the home schooled students I had were miles behind their peers.

Instead she must sit in a class learning “tricky words” that she could read several years ago, learning maths that is so basic it makes her bored out of her skull, while trying to cope with a very distressing loud environment of people shouting, and learning nothing of any use to her to even make enduring this seem worthwhile. Do you really think she’d prefer an extra two days of this, to the detriment of ACTUAL learning and ACTUAL sports and ACTUAL time in nature and ACTUAL downtime, so that she can be there for “rewards” and “assemblies”? I highly doubt it, given the way she begs me every day not to be forced to go again.

She could focus on her music lessons and practice, her drawing, her writing, reading books, being out in nature, sports, without being so burned out she can’t cope with these things that actually do benefit her and teach her something (unlike what is being taught veeeerrrrry sllllooooowwwwly at school in reading and maths that’s about 4-5 years below her level but sucks up all her energy by being forced to be in that loud and horrendous environment all day long).

And have some downtime and peace and therefore not become suicidal again.

What would be bad about this? Please do explain @Babyboomtastic .

I of course understand that it wouldn’t be appropriate for all children. Nobody, as far as I’ve seen on the thread, is suggesting that it would be. However, for some children it would be very appropriate and beneficial so why the objection to it?

This is parents offering to do schools’ jobs for them for free because schools are failing some pupils. Why on Earth would the schools object to it? They should be grateful!

Why on earth wouldn’t anyone withdraw their child completely if they were in a horrendous environment, being taught stuff 5 years below their level and becoming so distressed they were suicidal? I really don’t get it. Flexi schooling is not a solution to that.

Thank you for saying this. I’ve also discovered that less than a day of the PGCE is spent on educating soon-to-be teachers about SEND. Given that most teachers seem to state that it’s one of the biggest challenges of their role, is the PGCE fit for purpose?

And for those who did the PGCE a long time ago, presumably there was no training at all, which would explain the misguided and ignorant views of many teachers (and SENCOs!) on these matters.

Again, a competent professional body would be requiring annual CPD which would have minimum standards of education for all teachers on these topics.

I’ve even had teachers suggesting that because my children mask at school it must be a “home issue” despite multiple assessments from doctors and educational psychologists and others making it perfectly clear that the thing causing them distress is school. As has their child psychologist who does weekly sessions with them, and the OFSTED registered nannies who work in our home and care for them while I work.

I’ve had teachers tell me my children aren’t autistic - despite their diagnoses - because they make eye contact and are articulate and intelligent. Apparently all autistic people are stupid. They’ve clearly never heard of Einstein, Newton, Mozart, Van Gogh, Michelangelo, Darwin, Gates, Cavendish, Tesla, Da Vinci, Beethoven, Orwell, Turing, Franklin, Jefferson, Jobs, Wittgenstein, Erdos, Vernon Smith etc…

I agree with you wholeheartedly!!

My point was with a timetable like that on a Friday, what a child would miss is tiny. With a school set up with Flexi in mind, they'd 'miss' even less.

We do so much more than they could do in school, and when we focus on more academic aspects like phonics and writing, it's 1-2-1 and she gets so much more from it.

Ok. So I withdraw her and do what, exactly?

I am a lone parent. I pay for the nice house they live in, nannies to care for them outside school while I’m working, their medical care that the NHS has refused to provide within an acceptable timeframe including operations.

If I withdraw her what’s your proposal? I home school her?

I’d love to do that. But then she’d had to live in a cardboard box in the street as there’s nobody earning the money paying for her or my son to have a nice home or her toys or their medical care or anything at all. Not great for any child to live in a box in the rain with nothing to eat, but I’d suggest even worse for two with huge anxiety and sensory issues.

Please let me know what your proposed solution is, aside from me waiting for my son to create his cloning machine so one of me can do what I do now (providing for them financially, parenting two children with disabilities and running a household alone, and spending hours every week fighting the Local Authority for the support they’re legally entitled to but not receiving so they can actually attend school and receive an education) while being their full-time teacher at the same time.

Apparently it’s simple and I should just withdraw them from school. Please let me know how you expect us to live when the mortgage isn’t paid.

I am not against this but it riles me up no end that I can’t take my children on a term time holiday yet some can not be in school weekly. Makes no sense!

They’d miss nothing that mattered at all.

I honestly don’t understand why anybody has a problem with it in situations it makes perfect sense for the school and the child. I just wish I was in a position to do it!

Sorry that I misunderstood your previous post. Was rushing around as usual and thought you were saying it wouldn’t be feasible when you were saying the opposite, I see that now having re-read your post that I responded to. 🤦🏻‍♀️🤯🫣 The joys of being autistic! 😭 My apologies.

Well, there’s quite a difference between a child who has disabilities and CANNOT COPE WITH THE SCHOOL ENVIRONMENT and you wanting a cheaper holiday, isn’t there?

No worries.
I flexi my child who has some disabilities, to enable him to have the full time education he couldn't have at school.

We have a brilliant time with it as well :-)
It's knackering trying to juggle it and work though, but I'm grateful that we have the opportunity to make it work, and sad but understandable that it doesn't sound like a viable option for you. I hope things improve.

OR, should there perhaps be some kind of state school provided for my children that they can attend without is causing them severe mental distress and where they can actually learn, given the hundreds of thousands of pounds of tax I’ve paid over the last couple of decades, given that this is also their legal right as individuals even if I’d not paid a penny?

Would it not be a better investment for society to provide a school that gifted and talented children well into the top 1% of IQ could actually attend without trauma so that they can become so very productive taxpayers later in life, even if you don’t care about them from a moral perspective?

Or should we all just go and live in a box in the street because we don’t fit into your mould of what children “should” be able to manage? Waste their abilities and likely end up with them being a net drain on other taxpayers later in life because they’ve both driven to total mental health breakdown, rather than nurture them and let them join the very long list of autistic people in history responsible for most of your modern lifestyle and without whom you’d likely still be sitting in a cave in the dark hoping that wolves don’t eat you tonight.