HED0827

Written evidence submitted by [a member of the public]

[Note: This evidence has been redacted by the Committee. Text in square brackets has been inserted where text has been redacted.]

My Background

I was home educated from [year group] up until [year group]. I completed a recognised certificate of education at home as well as a [qualification] and went onto Sixth form, followed by [institution] to study [subject]. I now home-educate my children, and firmly believe this gives them the best start in life.

• The duties of local authorities with regards to home education, including safeguarding and assuring the quality of home education;
• Safeguarding is no more of an issue with home-educators than it is with school children. Both categories can fall under the radar. As it stands, the LEA has enough power to intervene and look into a particular situation should they desire to. Home educated children are often if anything more visible because they are often out during the day at museums or home education groups and stand out as not being in school. Neighbours, GPs, sports coaches, etc. are all meeting these home educated students and are able to report if they feel anything is remiss. There is plenty more that can be done to ensure home-educators are supported when they do try to reach out for simple things like vaccinations etc. Every single year to access a flu jab for my children, I have to go through the process of ringing my GP and explaining that my children are home-educated so will not be getting the flu vaccination in school. They never know what the process is for home-educated students and so normally have to go and find out and get back to me. They then send me through to a school nurse who also never seems to know the process. They then look into it and offer for me to drive 30 minutes minimum to a later catchup clinic so my children can have their vaccinations. Episodes like this will often cause home educating parents to not want to get their children vaccinated due to the extreme effort and often quite rude responses they can get (the school nurse said to me that it was complicated as my child was hidden, which I found quite frustrating as they obviously weren’t hidden as I was making a massive effort to try and get them seen). So instead of tightening up on safeguarding, the local authorities need to ensure they are just meeting the basic needs of providing a simple way for home-educators to access things like vaccinations without all the fuss and confusion.

• Whether a statutory register of home-educated children is required;
• Children who have been registered in a school already have to notify the LA and can be checked up on (quite often the LA doesn’t even have the time to do this). Home educating your children is a legal right for parents and by requiring them to register, you are implying they need to be checked up on. This doesn’t happen in any other context, unless abuse is suspected, and the LA already have the right to investigate a family if it is suspected that an adequate education is not being given.

• The benefits children gain from home education, and the potential disadvantages they may face;
• Home educated children benefit from being able to have an education tailored to their needs and preferences. The parent to child ratio is so much smaller than in a classroom and so automatically they are able to get more support and help throughout their education. Learning can be a lot more holistic, where children learn not only the basic subjects like maths and English, but also how to run a home, cook, shop, etc. as they will live these experiences with their parents. When I was home educated, I was able to get most of my written work completed in the morning. This left me time to be able to focus on other skills such as music and sport. My love for sport led me to become both a gymnastics coach, volleyball coach, and umpire. I was able to coach at various clubs in the afternoons and build my experience, even once coaching volleyball at a local college to students there. If I had been in school, this would have not been possible due to being in school all day and not having the time or opportunity to follow these passions. The flexibility of home education also gives opportunities for learning anywhere in the world. We went on holiday to New Zealand once in a campervan and spent the time learning about glaciers, culture etc. whilst actually being able to see it for real, not just in a text book. Children are also able to learn at their own pace, and not have to get left behind other students, or held up by other student’s abilities. This is so good for confidence, and has given me the knowledge that if I work at something hard enough, I can often accomplish it.
• The main disadvantages of home education stem from financial difficulties I would say, as we live in a world that is suited for both parents going out to work and bringing in two lots of income. This means that for home educating parents where one parent stays at home, they are often sacrificing an income and believe very strongly that they are giving their child the best opportunity. They have to pay taxes towards schools that they are not using and then have to pay for their children to take exams on top of that. For that reason, home educating parents do not take the decision to home educate lightly, as they have to work so much harder to make ends meet. (a lot of parents work in the evenings or the one parent works very long hours to make up the money).
• The quality and accessibility of support (including financial support) available for home educators and their children, including those with special educational needs, disabilities, mental health issues, or caring responsibilities, and those making the transition to further and higher education;
• There is very little support of any sort for home-educators (I outlined the trouble they face to get vaccinations and the financial implications above). There should be some way of at least financially supporting home educated students by providing for the cost of exams etc. if the family wanted it. This however should be done on a voluntary basis and not forced upon families as a way of making them register.

• Whether the current regulatory framework is sufficient to ensure that the wellbeing and academic achievement of home educated children is safeguarded, including where they may attend unregistered schools, have been formally excluded from school, or have been subject to ‘off-rolling’;
• The current regulations are sufficient, and all the above situations like exclusions, unregistered schools and off-rolling are problems within the school system and not home education. The regulatory framework that needs looking at therefore, is that of the schools, not the home educator’s.

• The role that inspection should play in future regulation of home education;
• The government will not be able to ensure every LA keeps to the same standards or rules, as there are many examples of already with LA inspectors not even knowing the current laws regarding home education. Enforced regular regulation or inspections could be subjective and are likely to be used in certain circumstances to abuse families. Money will also be wasted, trying to regulate the vast majority who do a very good job of home educating. Those parents who are actually abusive, and unregistered schools will only be driven more underground and will be harder to find and regulate. The money should instead be used to better train LA inspectors on the current rules surrounding home education and to make it easier for home educating students to access the qualifications they want to.

• What improvements have been made to support home educators since the 2010-15 Education Committee published their report on ‘Support for Home Education’ in 2012; and
• There have been very little improvements made, and individual LA inspectors have often interpreted the rules how they want to, causing confusion.

• The impact COVID-19 has had on home educated children, and what additional measures might need to be taken in order to mitigate any negative impacts.’
• Covid restrictions have meant that home educated students have not been allowed to mix socially with other children whilst schoolchildren have often been allowed to continue meeting at school. The guidance has been confusing and not clear with regards to what is and isn’t allowed for home-educators, often leading to different groups such as drama, music, sports during the day not meeting for fear of breaking the rules. These activities are obviously still continuing within the schools so this leaves home educated students at a disadvantage. The guidance needs to be much clearer and provisions need to be made to enable the groups that home educators normally attend to continue (obviously with health and safety precautions in place such as the schools follow).
• Home educated students were let down this year when exams were cancelled because unless they had a tutor or exam centre to assess them, they simply had no other option but to wait until they could sit the exam later in the year, putting their life on hold. This meant education has had to be delayed for many students despite them having prepared for exams and applied to colleges and universities. There needs to be a provision in the future for home educated students if this were to happen again, such as parents being able to provide transcripts or the students being assessed virtually.

November 2020