Wednesday 30 May 2012

Local authorities and home educators

Let us try and approach this topic with an open mind and see what common ground there might be; the sort of things with which everybody would agree. In the first place, it is almost certainly true that most home educating parents love and care for their children just as much as parents who send their children to school. Indeed, I would guess that on the whole, home educating parents tend to be even more concerned about their children’s welfare and education than those who do not assume responsibility for their child’s education.


We can probably also agree that among those parents who do not send their children to school, there will be some who neglect their child’s education and others who are abusive and cruel. This is the case with parents who do send their kids to school and so it would be unlikely to be any different with those who don’t.

So far, so good. I think that most home educating parents, as well as most local authority officers would find nothing so far to which they could object.

Local authorities fear that  a substantial number of parents who do not send their children to school are neglectful of their children’s needs and that their children are possibly suffering harm by being at home, rather than at school. Is this likely? In other words, is there any evidence that children kept at home are more likely to be at risk than those sent to school?

The first thing that we must avoid doing is to judge home educators by the type of people one comes across on the Internet. Many of these people are unbalanced and do not give a brilliant impression of home educators to outsiders. One clue about the likely incidence of strange people  is that groups of people committed to what most people would see as weird and far-out ideas do tend to have a pretty high proportion of individuals who range from eccentric to raving mad. This is so with animal rights activists, nudists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, home educators and various other fringe groups. Many of these people will be fairly normal, quite a few will be on the borderline and a good number will be extremely odd. The proportion of very odd people in such groups is likely to be higher than in mainstream organisations such as the Rotarians, a reading group or members of a bowls club.

The tricky part with home educators is that by definition, such people are more intimately associated with children than are the members of most, for want of a better expression, crank movements. This puts them into a different class from those who worship the sun at Stonehenge or drink their own urine.  What adults do to themselves is in general  not, or should not be, any concern of either the government or the local authority. Where children are concerned, the case is altered.

What I have done here is really to clear the ground and set out a few thoughts that most people would agree with. I shall build on tis foundation in the coming days.

36 comments:

  1. I wonder why someone (or more than one person?) from knowledgenetwork.gov.uk, apparently the national knowledge management platform for health and social care, is visiting your blog regularly? Hopefully it's just someone interested in or currently home educating their own children who is using the internet from work during breaks.

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  2. Anonymous - how did you find that out? It's very curious though!

    So far Simon, I agree with you on these points. As far as I am aware, there really is no evidence that home educated children are more at risk than schooled children. Maybe someone else knows differently?

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  3. The thing that sets most home educators apart from the run of the mill parent is that they value education more highly than most. Surely? Given the financial sacrifice it involves, to home educate normally takes enormous commitment to education.

    Old Mum

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    1. No, it's evident that home educators are no different to many 'run of the mill parents'. Judgmental,self righteous, aggressive and quick to stereotype.
      Many many other parents from hugely diverse backgrounds highly value education.
      You really have no right to judge simply because you have the opportunity to home educate.
      What you have stated above is simple minded, ill reasoned snobbery.

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  4. Risk and hazard doesn't work that way. It's never going to be a straightforward case of home ed being the root cause of abuse, more of an accumulation of extreme beliefs or practices. As with Enice Spry and Angela Gordon, religion was the key factor, but mental illness makes a situation all the more volatile and poorly educated parent(s)might make a domestic setting extremely dangerous.
    If the child has behavioural issues the risk factor is magnified and stress may become the catalyst that sparks abuse or violence.
    Weird belief memes or practices picked up from websites and 'friends' may be another critical component of an abusive/violent episode.

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  5. 'The thing that sets most home educators apart from the run of the mill parent is that they value education more highly than most. Surely? Given the financial sacrifice it involves, to home educate normally takes enormous commitment to education.'

    This is quite true, at least among every home edcuator whom I have ever had dealings with. We must consider though that a central plank of the argument by councils for increased monitoring powers is that not all who fail to send their children to school are in fact home educators. It is their assertion that quite few parents might be keeping their children at home because they have argued quarreled with the school, are evading prosecution for truancy, wish to abuse their children are are just very weird. It is this group whom loal authorities say they wish to identify and the only way it can be done is by speaking to families.

    Simon.

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    1. So, are you suggesting that there is a way that home educators could distinguish themselves from the groups which LAs are worried about which you have outlined above?

      Old Mum

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  6. 'It's never going to be a straightforward case of home ed being the root cause of abuse, more of an accumulation of extreme beliefs or practices. As with Enice Spry and Angela Gordon, religion was the key factor, but mental illness makes a situation all the more volatile and poorly educated parent(s)might make a domestic setting extremely dangerous.'

    All of which I agree with completely. This is why home education is sometimes seen as a risk factor, not as a risk in itself. This explains why local authorities wish to see families, so that they can gauge whether or not this is just a family wishing to edcuate their own child or whether the home edcuation is just one aspect of a toxic mix of beliefs, some of which might be harmful to the child.

    Simon.

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  7. what if an LEA sees a family and then lies about the family because the lEA officers does not like them?

    not that the law is going to be changed over home visits as it would cost to much to inforce. most people want any spare money spent on local schools not on home educators!

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  8. I have always felt that the place to start would be with adequate training for LA staff on how home education works. Part of that needs to help those staff address possible prejudices they may have about those of a different class, faith or other belief system. I think it's perfectly clear that factors like being a single parent or living in a poorer area can lead to very different treatment at the hands of an LA. I have seen that happen. Then the LA could offer some services that are actually useful - like free exams centres and meeting space.

    Get that right first and then maybe discuss things like registration and ongoing contact of some sort.

    I am not completely anti all LA involvement (though I'm happy that they don't bother my family) but it needs to start from a place of mutual respect. As things stand at the moment, many home educators would not go near their local authority in search of support for themselves or to voice concern about anyone else.

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  9. '. Part of that needs to help those staff address possible prejudices they may have about those of a different class, faith or other belief system. I think it's perfectly clear that factors like being a single parent or living in a poorer area can lead to very different treatment at the hands of an LA. '

    This is not prejudice, but rather an acceptance that different classes and social backgrounds carry with them different risks. The chances of a child from a single parent household being killed in a road accident are roughly twice those of a child who lives with both parents. Children of parents who have never worked are thirty seven times as likely to die in a house fire as a child whose parents are from managerial or professional backgrounds.

    Taking account of factors like this when assessing risk is not prejudice, but merely common sense. That is why single parents and people in poor areas receive different treatment; their children may be at vastly increased risk of coming to harm.

    Simon.

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  10. Well, I take your point but I think it sometimes *is* prejudice. Taking into account different levels of risk based on statistics is not the same as making assumptions about individuals based on their membership of a group. I don't have a problem with LA staff being aware of the increased risks to children living in poverty but I do have a problem with those staff making assumptions about parents' ability to home educate based on things like their address or their accent.

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  11. 'I do have a problem with those staff making assumptions about parents' ability to home educate based on things like their address or their accent.'

    Again Allie, the evidence indicates that this is no more than a sensible precaution. Children from working class homes have only about a third as many words spoken to them by their parents as do those from middle class homes. Since much home education is based upon the so-called 'conversational learning' model, this lack of conversation can be worrying. This is just one example; there are many others.

    Simon.

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  12. What action should be taken over any LA officer who tells lies about a family/children or do LA's never tell lies?

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    1. If this has happened, then I would suggest consulting a solicitor.

      Old Mum

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  13. we did consult a solictor but its a tricky area of law it did help but it did not address all the issues we had you may want a sorry from that lEA officer for lieing but he can just change what he wrote and put it down correct but you dont get a sorry! and the ombusdmans does not think that all lies are a serious issue it depends its a very tricky area of law!

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    1. So...the solicitor and ombudsman binned your grievances as trivial malicious litigation.

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  14. So many issues...

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  15. Do you feel big and clever when you take the piss?

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  16. Do you feel big and clever when you're abusive?

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    1. So suggesting that someone is taking the piss is abusive, but taking the piss isn't? If you can't take it, don't dish it out!

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    2. I'm suggesting that you're not very good at expressing yourself or communication in general and that you have deeply entrenched anger issues.
      It's pretty obvious that you don't have a very wide vocabulary or enough of a command of the English language to be anything other than a yobbish retard. You evidently like to sit in the safety of your own home logging on and giving it large as someone who might be quite threatening in real life. But..you aren't are you? In real life you're a sad individual with nothing of any value to say and way too thick to be even an amusing troll.

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    3. You can tell all this from just two very short comments (2 June 2012 02:35 and 3 June 2012 11:20)? Amazing. Are you some kind of psychic or something? Hope you haven't had to teach your child scientific technique because the conclusions you reach from so little evidence are ridiculous. Since I've *responded* to your original comments with similar comments, presumably everything you have concluded about me applies equally to you.

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    4. Hardly..I've used no profanities only reasonable argument and deduction based upon your abusive statements.

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    5. Really? You are that upset by, 'piss'? I must apologise, my working class background is showing. Taking the piss is/was such a common phrase it hadn't crossed my mind that people might be offended by it. It wasn't my intention.

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    6. Only when there's very little justification for it's use, and lets face it you've proved that you have bought nothing of any substance to add to the debate except the word 'Piss'.
      Now, that's hardly a class thing and we could discuss the origins of the word as a vernacular expression, but I doubt that you would be interested in doing that or understand it if we did.

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    7. Such a gracious acceptance of an apology. The only thing I intended to bring to the 'debate' was to point out that you were taking the piss. Hardly a substantive addition to the 'debate' on your part, eh? You are not someone I would want to learn anything from judging by your contributions to date. But I should procrastinating and get back to work.

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    8. I think you missed a 'stop' there, a Freudian slip if ever I've seen one - also guilty of using this blog as a displacement activity!

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  17. 'So, are you suggesting that there is a way that home educators could distinguish themselves from the groups which LAs are worried about which you have outlined above?

    Old Mum'

    The easiest end to accomplishing that purpose would be to invite local authority officers into the home, make them welcome, allow them to chat to the children and so on. I realise that this is not the favoured option of many!

    Simon.

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  18. But why do you think it would work? We know of many cases where it didn't help (Spry, Khyra Ishaq), do you know of any where it did? From my experience of several LAs, home visits are quite common (practically 100% in one area). You would think there would be a body of evidence to support their use by now. New Zealand used to have compulsory home visits, but dropped them year or so back because they were not cost effective as so few problems were revealed.

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  19. no the solictor helped get the LEA to change its records and to correct errors that had been made by 2 LEA officers! very helpful it was and it was great fun to catch those 2 LEA officers out as liars!

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    1. How did you find all the time to home educate and persue such malicious trivialities and get your son to all those chess tournaments...Don't you have a job?

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  20. 'Don't you have a job?'

    Bizarrely as it might sound, Mr Williams last job was painting wooden legs. He gave this up to stay home with his son. His wife, the sanest member of the family, works.

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    1. Why bizarre? Someone's got to do it and I'm sure the patients appreciated his handiwork.

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  21. He gave up his job?
    How fortunate that he could do that....his wife must have a very, very good job.

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    1. Or they lived cheaply so they could provide their child with the education they believe he deserves - one that allows time for chess. It would be much harder now with the way house prices and the cost of living has gone, but when we started (at a similar time to Peter) it was entirely possible to HE on a single income that was much lower than the national average.

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