Are parents allowed to deny a 16 year old education?

[COVID2019]

I am looking for advice for a young person I know. She sat her GCSEs in May / June this year and her results were lower than expected. Legally, I believe, she has to resit as she did not get the requisite grades in both maths and English. I imagine she will be allowed to do this. She’s being taken to work 5 days a week, 40 hours in the family business and being given 2 non consecutive days off a week. The environment is horrendous and rather disconcerting and she is not respected in the office, full of men.

My understanding is she is the only female employee and feels vulnerable. She is not mixing with her peers nor is she learning anything at work. She doesn’t have the skills needed at this time. Ideally she would be shadowing the men in the office to learn the ropes but this isn’t happening and she is being treated awfully. She said to me she feels her life is over.

Her parents previously agreed she could go to college but since some minor misdemeanour a couple of months ago, she is being made to go to work full time. She wants to go to college and it’s crunch time now and is too afraid to ask her parents. She had planned to start on a level 3 course and the college have confirmed they will take her on the same course at foundation / level 2.

I have told her to speak to her parents. Any advice would be welcome.

Excuse the burner username, it’s one I made some time ago but never used and may share this with said young person.

16 year old school leavers can legally work full time but MUST also be enrolled in education or training (280 hours) taught by a lecturer tutor or supervisor. I think that most commonly means 1 day a week in college. See gov.uk education hub and search can I leave school at 16

She doesn't have to stay with them. She's 16 and can access study whilst living elsewhere - and access benefits as an under 21 year old without parental support.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/universal-credit-and-students#studying-full-time

All I can say is that I wish I'd known about that when I was 16. It would have made a huge difference to my life then and my future.

I might start by talking to the school attendance people in the Local Authority.

The parents will be in the firing line both as individuals and as the business.

I might also contact Social Services to see what they have to say

You'll need the NEET team (Not in Education, Employment or Training, the name may differ but the principle's the same everywhere). School attendance won't be involved because she's over statutory school leaving age.

SS might not be a quick one because they'll be dealing with the consequences of the six week holiday for children at the moment, but the NEET team should be firing on all cylinders right now.

Just be aware too that there may be a very different story behind it.

One of mine used to love a sympathetic adult ear and the original story of "I had to tidy my room (2nd largest room in the house) because it was waist high in rubbish, and I asked if I could give up dance this term because I wanted to do football" by the time she'd finished telling someone she would have had to tidy the entire house, storing everything in her room (which was a box room with no window) and had been forced to give up dance and take football instead as a punishment...
She never set out to do this, but the more sympathetic the adult the more outrageous the stories got, and when the sympathetic adult came to me with concerns, they had no idea it wasn't true.

She was very plausible, and now has absolutely no idea why she told these lies. She would get carried away as she told them. She's now training to act where she can get paid for doing it (hopefully).

That’s brilliant. Thank you for your answers. I really appreciate it. I will see what the weekend brings for her as I don’t want to raise alarm bells. I may speak to her parents but I am concerned I could make it worse. I am the one, who persuaded them to let her go in the first place but I used the angle of A levels or equivalent is the base line these days. One parent was highly educated but born abroad, not so the other. I cannot understand how they would allow this to happen.

I was under the impression that the school leaving age in England is 18, unless the young person obtains an apprenticeship or joins one of the forces ?

Cross post. Thanks for your perspective. I have a child the same age and I know the parents and this isn’t the case. We haven’t seen her since the misdemeanour. I am fully aware of what the misdemeanour is and was in communication with the parents after the event. I don’t want to say what it is in case this is ever seen. But trust me, nothing untoward.

I am sorry to read that Mooncup. I see your posts a lot and you will have seen mine under my usual username. I don’t think she would do this, princess in a gilded cage.

This is so frustrating, do they think theres no point in her continuing in education as her results are not meeting their expectations?

I don’t know. I don’t understand it myself. They don’t care that she hasn’t passed her GCSEs. They just want her to work in the family business. But she’s too young and inexperienced to be of use.