Another case from America

No, I don't think for a moment that many children are living in these conditions, home educated or not, but this article gives you some idea of what professionals worry about when children are completely out of sight. It is unlikely that these four would have been unobserved, had they been attending nursery or school. It is also probable that if they had had to register as home educators and accept a visit, it would be hard to disguise the conditions under which they were living:

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Boys+seized+from+Denver+home+malnourished+without+speech/9009170/story.html

The abuse of home educated children

Over the last week or so, I have been pointing out that abuse rates for home educated children are far higher than those for children at school. I have also been discussing one factor which causes this to be so; the high proportion of home educated children with learning difficulties and behavioral problems. Inevitably, this has caused offence to some, but since I find the abuse of children with special educational needs offensive, I don’t think I need worry unduly about any offence I might have caused by drawing attention to the scale of the problem.

One of those commenting here trotted out a few of the hoary old myths associated with home education and I propose today to tackle these and lay the ground for looking tomorrow at some actual figures about the abuse of home educated children. First though, let’s look at what was suggested yesterday. The first concerns the abuse of children with special educational needs, which is relevant for reasons at which I have already looked:

I would suggest that before the professionals turn their attention to a group where there is no evidence of abuse, they look at residential school settings where, sadly, there is such evidence, including one school where OFSTED gave it a glowing report, then rapidly downgraded it to 'unsatisfactory' when it realised that the safeguarding was so brilliant that a girl was excluded for being raped because it was against school policy to have sex.

those of us who are home educating because we removed our children from school situations that constituted neglect, physical abuse and emotional abuse need to hear.


This was by a mother who has children with special needs and is hinting that the abuse and neglect of such children is primarily a problem in schools and residential units. This ties in neatly with the mythology adopted by many home educators, that schools are dangerous and unsafe places for their children; rife with abuse and neglect. This is utterly untrue. I am using research mainly from America here, simply because that undertaken in this country has been patchy and small-scale. Looking at the question of abuse and neglect in general, who are the perpetrators? One study, (NCANDS, 2005) found that the figures were as follows;

79.4% parents
6.8% other relatives
3.8% unmarried partners of a parent

The rest were nearly all friends and neighbours of the family.  Abuse and neglect in schools and residential settings was completely insignificant. How insignificant? Another study looked at this, (USDHHS, 2007), and found that less than 1% of cases of abuse were by residential staff, teachers or other professionals. Yes, that’s right; less than 1%. What research there has been in this country tends to confirm these findings.

Neglect and abuse, whether sexual, physical or emotional, are domestic problems. They almost invariably take place in the home. The idea that removing a child from school will make him or her less likely to be abused is, generally speaking, nonsense. 

Another thing which the person commenting here yesterday said was this:

Would you not agree that even within those groups the overwhelming majority of children were not abused? 

If we are talking about children with special educational needs and disabilities, then this is tricky to answer. It depends what you mean by an overwhelming majority. In studies both here and the USA, some of them enormous, it was found time and time again that children with special needs were neglected and abused far more than children without such difficulties. How much more likely was they to be abused or neglected? Thinking now about those with learning difficulties and behavioral problems, one piece of research, (Sullivan & Knutson, 2009) found that:

The children at highest risk were those with behavioral disorders. Their risk is seven times higher for neglect, physical abuse and emotional abuse, and 5.5 times higher for sexual abuse than are children without disabilities.

Consider that statistic carefully;  a child with behavioral difficulties is seven times as likely to be neglected or physically abused. What is truly horrifying is that in the largest of such studies, of over 50,000 children in Nebraska, (Sullivan, 2000), it was found that overall, a third of children with special needs and disabilities had been neglected and/or abused. Returning then to the comment made yesterday, in which I was invited to agree that the overwhelming majority of children were not abused, then we must ask ourselves if we view 66% as an overwhelming majority? Around 33% of children with special educational needs are abused by their family and friends, while about 66% are not. I'm not sure that I would call 66%, an 'overwhelming majority'.

Here then is the implication for home education. If we assume, and I guess that most home educating parents will do so, that home educators  are no more likely to be wicked or abusive than other parents, then it is also fair to say that they are no more virtuous than other parents. That is to say that the levels of neglect and abuse inflicted by home educating parents are likely to be similar to those carried out by parents with children at school. What this means in plain terms is that a third of home educated children with behavioral difficulties are likely to be neglected or abused by their parents. 

Tomorrow, we will look at the implications of these percentages in practical terms when it comes to overall rates of abuse for home educated children. Because as we all know, a very large proportion of home educated children are on the autistic spectrum, have ADHD, or various types of behavioral difficulties. This means of course, that the proportion of home educated children being neglected and abused is likely to be far higher than in the school population as a whole.

Why are home educated children in the United Kingdom more likely to be neglected or abused than those at school?

I have had a couple of emails over the last few days, from home educating parents wanting to know what grounds I have for suggesting that their children are more at risk of neglect and abuse than those attending school. There are of course a number of factors involved here, but today I wish to examine just one of these.

When Ofsted conducted their survey of home education in late 2009, the inspectors spoke to the parents of 130 children. A quarter of these either had a statement of special educational needs or, when deregistered, had been at the stage known as ‘school action plus’; meaning that they needed extra support to cope with  a special educational need (Ofsted, 2010). Other surveys have similarly found a high proportion of home educated children with special needs (Hopwood et al, 2007).

I think that most home educating parents will be aware that these figures reflect accurately  the situation today. Let us work with the figure of 25% of home educated children having special needs or disabilities for the time being and see what the implications are for the risk of neglect and abuse of home educated children as a group.

Children with disabilities and special educational needs are at greatly increased risk of being physically, sexually or emotionally abused and/or being neglected. The largest survey conducted of this phenomenon was undertaken in the United States almost fifteen years ago. 40,000 children with disabilities or special educational needs were involved and such children were found to be about four times as likely to be neglected or physically abused as children without such difficulties (Sullivan & Knutson, 2000). The great majority of this neglect and abuse took place in the home.

There are many imponderables here, but if we use the figures provided by such research as that cited above, then we find that that 25% of home educated children, those with disabilities or special needs, are likely to contain four times as many incidents of neglect or physical abuse, compared with children who do not have their special needs. Looking at home educated children as a group, this has the effect of increasing the likely incidence of neglect and abuse by 75% overall. This means that taking a home educated child at random, that child is 75% more likely to be the victim of  neglect or abuse than a child at school, purely as a result of this one factor. In reality, of course, the risk to home educated children is greater than this, for various other reasons at which I shall be looking in the future.  For now though, it is enough to say that the chance of a home educated child being abused or neglected is at least 75% higher than for children at school.

How home educators can make life easier for themselves when engaging with professionals

I wrote yesterday about how parents could attract unfavourable attention to themselves by displaying too many behaviours of a certain type. Failing 'to engage with services' is one of these, as is not sending your kid to school or nursery and missing appointments which have been made by doctors and health centres. Now it is important to realise that none of these things in themselves are likely to cause problems for a parent. Just ticking three items on one of the checklists or protocols won't result in social services kicking down your door and taking away your children for adoption! What it does mean is that sometimes eyebrows will be raised and nursery teachers, Health Visitors, social workers and so on might exchange emails; asking of there is any cause for concern. I am all in favour of this, because it is a valuable sifting process which often identifies children at risk of neglect or abuse. It's not infallible, of course; as some high profile cases in recent days have demonstrated. Still, it's a good deal better than nothing.

So those who are worried that 'failing to engage with services' will bring them problems, don't need to be overly concerned. The real problems can  start when something out of the ordinary happens to a child who has already been the object of remark in this way. Say. for instance, a child who is not at nursery or school, whose parents do not turn up for vaccinations, who has avoided health Visitors; suppose such a child presents at the GP with what might possibly be non-accidental injuries?  Now, the questions may begin. This actually happened to me when my daughter was a baby and it is worth seeing how such things can work out. I was an habitual avoider of services and dodger of Health Visitors and there was never any question of my daughter attending nursery or school.  When she was young, I used to help run groups for parents who were unable to cope with their under-5s, usually because the kid had a special need of some sort. Some of these children were exceedingly aggressive. One day, i left my daughter asleep in her buggy, turned my back for a moment and a three year-old boy bit her on the face. When I say bit, I mean bit! His mother had to prise him away from my daughters cheek like a rottweiler!

Now without going into too many details, the mark on my daughter's face from this attack, brought questions. I was quite open about the cause, did not resent the implication of those asking the questions that this might be a deliberate injury to my child, caused within the family. The result was that the whole thing fizzled out; which is how it should of course have been.

It is at this stage that some home educators make life needlessly difficult for themselves. Quite a few that one sees on the various lists have gone mad at this point, when they have been asked questions of this sort. Remember, these are often parents like me, who have declined services and refused nursery places. They have already brought themselves to attention in this way. Then, when they are asked what they see as insulting questions, they react with anger and aggression. Worse, they sometimes attempt to conceal the truth from professionals. We recently saw a parent on one list advised to give a false name and address and pretend to be moving out of the district,  just because she has been asked a question. In the past, we have seen parents who do not want to use their local hospital, because they are afraid that the local authority will learn of their existence.  They have travelled to another part of the country to attend A & E for this reason. Others, refuse to register their children with  a GP. Then, to cap it all, when they are asked about any of this, they become aggressive. Little wonder that they are by that time regarded by social services as probable abusers!

In short, no parent is going to run into any real difficulties simply for refusing to engage with any services on offer. They must realise though that they might draw attention to themselves. If, at a later stage, they are asked questions and become defensive or angry, then they could perhaps create problems which will make their lives difficult. Returning to the incident with my daughter, imagine if I had tried to give a false name and address when asked about her injuries! What if I had taken her to a hospital in a neighbouring county, because I didn't want my local authority to learn of her existence?  Worse still, suppose I had raised my voice and become aggressive when the questions began? The systems for identifying children at risk are not designed to trap home educating parents. But from time to time, this can happen, for reasons which I have explained. Under such circumstances, parents can either smooth matters over amicably, or they can make matters a hundred times worse by their behaviour. This is a choice for individual  home educators to make, but I know which I think makes more sense!

Another popular complaint by home educators

We looked yesterday at a popular complaint by home educators in this country; that despite there being no evidence to suggest that home educated children were more at risk of abuse, some professionals behaved as though this were the case. We saw that there is at least some evidence of increased risk of abuse, but that home educating parents prefer to ignore it, as it makes them feel uncomfortable. Today, I want to examine another common claim by home educators, that focusing on home educated children is wasteful of resources and that social services and health authorities should instead target their attentions more finely to where they are actually needed.

There is a big problem with home education in this country and that is that it tends all too often to go hand in hand with  the kind of lifestyle which attracts unfavourable attention and gives rise to suspicions of abuse and neglect. I have of course touched on this theme before, but I want today to look in some detail at how this process works to the detriment of home educating families.

In order to identify neglect and abuse, those working in the fields of health and social services often use protocols which allow them to pick out warning signs. Some of these signs are fairly obvious; things like excessive alcohol use by parents or malnutrition of their children. Such clear-cut causes for concern are relatively rare and more often than not, warnings are raised by a constellation of more subtle indicators. This is where home educating parents often find themselves being looked at a little askance. Among the items to look out for on one commonly used instrument, for example, are these three:

Persistently not accessing health care for child/ante-natal care/not acting on  medical advice/untreated ailments (including concealed pregnancy/birth

Repeated missed appointments, or sustained reluctance to engage with services

Serious school/nursery attendance concerns

Already, readers might be seeing the nature of the problem.  Some mothers, and there are many in the home educating community, do not approve of vaccinations and refuse to take their children along to the health centre for them. This behaviour can be difficult to distinguish from that of  the chaotic and disorganised parent who does not attend simply because she can’t be bothered or has forgotten about the appointment.

‘Reluctance to engage with services’; well, I think we all know many home educating parents who display this trait!

‘Serious school attendance concerns’ can be interpreted as not sending a child to nursery or school at all.

Perhaps now, readers will begin to see how innocent home educating parents can come to find themselves being targeted, not because they are actually abusers, but because their conduct and way of life can be very difficult to distinguish from those parents who are genuinely neglecting their children? When we add to this the indisputable fact that a large number of home educated children have special educational needs of one sort or another, the situation becomes even more complex. This is because having a child with special needs is in itself viewed as a risk factor for abuse and neglect.

I have written before of the foolishness of those home educating parents who then go on to make matters worse by playing silly beggars and going out of their way to prevent professionals from knowing anything about their children. These people are setting themselves up for trouble.

The problem then, is not that social workers, teachers and nurses are zeroing in on home educated children, when they should be doing more to identify those children genuinely in need of their services.  It is that the instruments that they use to find those children in danger of abuse or neglect do tend to lead them to many home educated children as well. The remedy for this is for home educating parents to be aware of this tendency and to guard against it. There are many things that families are able to do to alleviate anxieties on the part of professionals charged with protecting the welfare of children.  Setting out to be awkward and give the impression of wanting to hide from health and education services  is not likely to help anybody.