Cases of death resulting from children being educated at home or not sent to school are, mercifully, very rare in this country. In the last eleven years there has been Victoria Climbie, Khyra Ishaq and the three children of one mother who died last year in Edinburgh. That is three serious cases in over a decade. Nevertheless, there is a tendency to take individual cases involving children and then use them as a platform to demonstrate that wide ranging changes in the law are necessary. So the death of Victoria Climbie precipitated the Every Child Matters programme, the 2004 Children Act and ContactPoint. Clearly, those in government have never heard the old legal saying that hard cases make bad law!
We seem to like personalising laws about children in this way and adopting some photogenic dead kid as the poster girls of any such initiative. How else to explain actually giving laws nicknames associated with dead children; Megan's Law and Sarah's Law for instance?
I have been musing on this recently while watching events unfold in the USA. There are currently moves afoot to introduce compulsory registration of home educated children in a number of states. The latest was Illinois, which has now been abandoned, at least for now. This desire to legislate is being driven in part by the number of cases of cruelty to, neglect and in some cases murder of children who are not attending school. Now there are far more home educated children in America than there are in this country and so one would expect more cases of this sort of thing statistically. Even so, they do seem to be coming thick and fast at the moment. Each one triggers new anxiety among those whose children do go to school. I drew attention to two cases this month in a post a few days ago. Here are three more;
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/CRIME/02/24/oklahoma.abuse.case/index.html?npt=NP1
http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/9170716/
http://www.etidbits.com/keith-scott-brown-of-the-five-browns-pleads-guilty-to-sexually-abusing-his-daughters=2830
The first of these involves home educated adopted children, which seems to be becoming a regular news item in American papers. The others are also pretty horrible. This makes five widely publicised cases of this sort of abuse this month alone. I dare say there have been others which I have missed. It is this which is making ordinary people in the USA a little uneasy about the practice of home education. Once again, just as in this country, the focus of concerns seems to be not education as such, but rather the dangers of children suffering cruelty and abuse if they do not attend school. It will be interesting to see how things develop across the Atlantic. I have an idea that before long, one particular case of this sort will acquire an identity of its own, the name of some dead little girl, and we will see the passing of something like Megan's Law, compelling home educating parents to register with the state.
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Simon said "Cases of death resulting from children being educated at home or not sent to school are, mercifully, very rare in this country"
ReplyDeleteSimon, A child does not die from home education or lack of it. A child dies from abuse which has nothing whatsoever to do with education. Children are often uneducated but it doesnt mean they are abused or that they will die.
The children you mentioned did not die because they were home educated. There was long term, systematic abuse which happened even before any withdrawal/non-attendance at school. These children were known to their local authorities and social services. These children were not protected or saved by these services.
Why would you try to set the cat amongst the pigeons when home educators are trying to show we aren't abusers? Even if your intention is to support home educators, the way this piece is written (inaccurately) puts names to their fears If LAs and mainstream people read your posts, what will they think of the HE community,? Because you know poeple generally have a tnedancy to think the worst!
I'm going to have to agree with C on this one.
ReplyDeleteIt reads very negatively for He families. Perhaps an edit is in order, to draw attention away from HE being a contributory factor in these childrens deaths (which is how it would read to a mainstreamer).
Loz
Hi Simon,
ReplyDeleteI posted a fairly long reply on your piece on SEN this morning, explaining exactly how services worked and what was lost to families if they took a child with SEN out of school. I though it might be helpful to families who read your blog to be clear and not put off by slightly inaccurate information. I see that it has gone. Is there a problem? I really think it would be useful to have full information there.
Christine
' Perhaps an edit is in order, to draw attention away from HE being a contributory factor in these childrens deaths (which is how it would read to a mainstreamer).'
ReplyDeleteThe whole point is that home education, or at the very least not being at school, was being seen as a contributory factor in these cases. I am perfectly aware that, as C points out, children do not die as a direct result of being home educated! I am trying to explain a trend in America which is leading to demands for the registration of home educated children. It is similar to the trend which has been observed in this country following high profile cases like Victoria Climbie and Khyra Ishaq. One can of course ignore this sort of thing, but I do not choose to do so. it is very often the case that what happens in the USA around home education, happens here a few years later. For this reason alone, it would be good to keep an eye on what is happening there.
The neglect and abuse of adopted children who are educated at home seems to be a peculiarly American phenomenon, although of course we did have Eunice Spry in this country.
Blogspot are still directing some posts to the spam area and I have just published these. Sorry about that!
ReplyDeleteC and Loz, you seem to be under the misapprehension that Simon would want to minimise these links. However, he is pro-registration, so tends to use any 'fact', that supports its introduction. He has himself said that Khyra Ishaq would probably still be alive if registration and compulsory visits had been in force. See his post of Friday, 26 February 2010, 'Why Khyra Ishaq would probably still be alive if the Children, Schools and Families Bill 2009 had been in force while she was alive'.
ReplyDeleteBoth the Spry and Ishaq cases that involved 'home education' were also inextricably entwined with religious belief. Eunice Spry a devout Jehovas Witness and Angela Gordon a convert to Islam. It was widely reported that Angela Gordon and her partner believed that Kyrah was possessed in some way.
ReplyDelete"So the death of Victoria Climbie precipitated the Every Child Matters programme, the 2004 Children Act and ContactPoint. Clearly, those in government have never heard the old legal saying that hard cases make bad law!"
ReplyDeleteIt's also possibly a case of government using the deaths of children to introduce pre-existing plans. See Gill Gillner's post, sometimesitspeaceful.blogspot.com/2009/02/ecm-did-it-really-all-come-from-laming.html which suggests that the ECM agenda was really driven by the Lisbon Agreement.
Here's a link to the SCR.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.lscbbirmingham.org.uk/downloads/case+14.pdf
Victoria Climbie was not home educated Webb! still peddling your half truths are you? indeed the charity set up in the name of Victoria made it very clear in a statement that Victoria was not home educated and she been let down by social services and the NSPCC!
ReplyDelete'Victoria Climbie was not home educated Webb! still peddling your half truths are you?'
ReplyDeleteOf course she was not home educated;I have never said that she was. I said, 'children being educated at home or not sent to school ', into which latter category Victoria Climbie fell.
It's stated quite clearly that both Abu Hamza and Angela Gordon were diagnosed as suffering from 'mental illness'.
ReplyDeleteQuite how all of that adds up to home education being a cause for concern is a mystery.
'Both the Spry and Ishaq cases that involved 'home education' were also inextricably entwined with religious belief. Eunice Spry a devout Jehovas Witness and Angela Gordon a convert to Islam.'
ReplyDeleteNot sure how relevant this is. I did not send my own child to school for, among things, religious reasons. At least two or three of those who regularly comment here are God-fearing mothers. I am not at all sure that this is a factor in the abuse of home educated children. Some Christian groups in America advocate hitting children as a punishment, but they are not alone in this.
"Here's a link to the SCR.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.lscbbirmingham.org.uk/downloads/case+14.pdf"
The current address is:
http://www.lscbbirmingham.org.uk/downloads/Case+14+New.pdf
The health services didn't even plot a siblings weight measurements on a chart correctly. One of the main reasons for weighing a child it to compare it to previous records and check that growth is appropriate. Little information can be gained from an isolated weight which may fall just within the normal range for a child of that age and weight. It's only when you compare that weight to the child's history that you can see the child's weight dropping through the percentiles. I know this just as a parent who took their baby to be weighted at clinics! I If they can't get something that basic right...
You do not make it clear in your post that Victoria was not home educated and the charity set up in her name have also said so! The NSPCC had to also say sorry in a written letter for trying to inply that she was!
ReplyDeleteIt was social services and the NSPCC who let poor Victoria down why dont you do a post on that?
"Not sure how relevant this is. I did not send my own child to school for, among things, religious reasons."
ReplyDeleteIt seems more relevant that where they were being educated (or not educated) since the 'reasoning' behind the abuse appears to have been motivated by religion. I'm certainly not suggesting that religious people should face closer scrutiny of their family lives, but by the same token, neither should those choosing HE in preference to school.
'Home Schooling' in the USA...Wow there's a real minefield. Many home schoolers have some very strange and sinister affiliations to race hate organisations, fundamentalist Christian groups and patriot networks.
ReplyDeleteYou want to check this out...Google Stormfront, Be warned though, it's unpleasant and you'll need a strong stomach.
Not sure how Kyrah Ishaq and the Spry cases have got confused with Home ed...
ReplyDeleteThose poor children were never home educated, only abused.
Spry was even cleared by Social Services in order to foster/adopt.
Angela Gordon merely used home education as the means to isolate her children.
As for the USA and home ed...there are plenty of home schoolers in Britain willing to adopt the ACE curriculum. They appear blissfully unaware that it's a racist curriculum.
ReplyDeleteI think that US homeschooling is generally very different in nature to home education in the UK.
ReplyDeleteFor example, the US has always had groups of people who live separate lives from mainstream society - sometimes those are *very* separate. Of course those people will often homeschool and sometimes those sub-cultures will involve abuse - entrenched systems for the subjugation of women and girls, for example. I would characterise such situations as mass abuse defended with reference to religious scripture. If anyone wants to read more about the experiences of women in such situations then have a look at this:
http://nolongerquivering.com/
Then there is the whole child beating as a parenting strategy thing that is linked to certain US advocates of home schooling. There just isn't anything comparable happening in the UK. No-one publishes books in the UK that advocate the beating of babies, for example.
One of the things that I think UK home educators do need to bear in mind, however, is that home schooling often calls to other people's minds the sort of sad and sinister cases Simon has highlighted here. That's why I always make it very clear to those who ask about home ed that my children are very much part of our local community.
I agree with Allie about the big differences in culture between UK and US - this is seen in so many areas other than education (for example - I find it difficult to understand the whole "right to bear arms" issue.)
ReplyDeleteHowever Simon may also be right that the cases he has mentioned are possibly going to eventually impact on the situation over here - it doesn't really matter whether the children were already at risk because of a number of unrelated issues, it all depends on what the press and then legislators pick up on. Sadly the bare truth is sometimes irrelevant - reading the Daily Mail should be evidence enough of that!
"However Simon may also be right that the cases he has mentioned are possibly going to eventually impact on the situation over here"
ReplyDeleteYes. People who want registration, like Simon for instance, tend to latch onto the deaths of children and use them to push their own agenda. Even if, on closer examination, the child's death had nothing to do with HE, there are enough people out there who will not make that close examination and will believe what they are told because it sounds possible.
Most states in the US already require registration and record-keeping - a fact that many in the UK seem to misunderstand. UK HE families shouldn't be frightened by any "push for registration" in the US - most states already have far tougher laws than here, and this has not stopped the growth of home education or even the growth of unschooling: people simply develop better record-keeping systems and move on. The only 'shocking recent development' in homeschooling in the US is the drive to give parents tax breaks for doing it (opposed by many homeschoolers because it would probably come with mandatory yearly testing attached)
ReplyDeleteThe recent publicity around these types of abuse cases is not an HE-specific phenomenon. The US media publicises the details of child abuse cases much more frequently than the UK media, and 'unusual' families of any type - religious or linguistic minorities, home educators, very large families, etc.- tend to get more coverage. These are seen as more interesting to readers than an alcoholic father who simply beats his child in a typical suburb.
None of this is anything new. What is new is the more active movement of some right-wing homeschool-advocacy groups into politics. In order to raise money for activities that have nothing to do with homeschooling (mostly campaigns against gay rights and birth control), they 'alert' followers to every home-education related 'crisis' they can come up with, to emphasise the "threat to homeschooling" and encourage donations.
'What is new is the more active movement of some right-wing homeschool-advocacy groups into politics. In order to raise money for activities that have nothing to do with homeschooling (mostly campaigns against gay rights and birth control), they 'alert' followers to every home-education related 'crisis' they can come up with, to emphasise the "threat to homeschooling" and encourage donations.'
ReplyDeleteThis is absolutely true. I think that the HSDLA know who we're talking about here....
"Most states in the US already require registration and record-keeping - a fact that many in the UK seem to misunderstand. UK HE families shouldn't be frightened by any "push for registration" in the US - most states already have far tougher laws than here, and this has not stopped the growth of home education or even the growth of unschooling:"
ReplyDeleteSome states also have less regulation than the UK and research last year found no difference in educational outcomes with regard to level of state regulation of home schooling. Unless there is evidence of benefit, how can the spending of taxpayers money be justified?
'Some states also have less regulation than the UK and research last year found no difference in educational outcomes with regard to level of state regulation of home schooling. Unless there is evidence of benefit, how can the spending of taxpayers money be justified?'
ReplyDeleteIt is possible that the benefits of regulation and closer supervision are not associated with the educational outcomes.
We still need evidence of benefit and no harm.
ReplyDelete