Tough lesson for home-educators

suzan.uzel@cambridge-news.co.uk

Parents who educate their children at home face having to register annually with their local authority to prove they are providing a "suitable" education.

Graham Badman's review of elective home education has been welcomed by children's secretary Ed Balls, who said there would be "better monitoring so that every home-educated child stays safe".

But the review, published earlier this year by Mr Badman - Kent's former education director - has provoked a backlash from parents who say they have been stigmatised as more likely to be child abusers.

The review of 74 local authorities found children educated at home were "twice as likely" to be known to social services than those not educated at home.

But Karl Meyer, from Cambridge Home Educating Families (Chef), who home-educates his 7-year-old daughter with his wife, said the review was based on "virtually no evidence".

Mr Meyer, from Duxford, said less than half of local authorities contacted "specifically gave figures for the percentage of home-educated children who were under review by the child welfare teams".

He added: "You could argue only those who have particular concerns would respond. Many local education authorities, once they realise a child is being home-educated, create a case under social services by default. That child is then on file with social services whether there is an issue or not."

He added that measures such as having to register annually and be "inspected" to assess suitability changed the presumption from "parents are doing a good job unless we find otherwise" to "parents are child abusers unless they can prove they are not".

Mr Meyer said: "This has angered many parents who have sacrificed lots to provide an education for their children."

He said it was "a bizarre logic" to suggest that a parent who wanted to spend time with his or her child was someone to be questioned and queried.

Mr Meyer stressed that school is, after all, not compulsory.

However, the law does state that children of school age must receive efficient, suitable education "at school or otherwise".

Currently, home educators do not have to seek permission to home educate and do not have to follow the National Curriculum or do SATs.

Mr Meyer said the benefits of home education were huge, as learning was one-on-one, so lessons go at the right pace for the child and can be taken in any direction.

A common question often asked about home education is, what about socialisation?

Mr Meyer said: "Within Chef there are more group activities scheduled each week than can actually be attended - from sports to drama, French to philosophy."

He said children had more flexibility thanks to home education as they could choose to sit GCSEs earlier - rather than being confronted with "an enormous exam block".

Mr Meyer added anyone with a "reasonable level of education" could follow textbooks and produce a curriculum.

Sue Stubbings, county attendance manager (for schools) at Cambridgeshire County Council, whose responsibilities include home education, said: "Every child has the right to an education and it's the responsibility of the local authority to make sure children are safe and that all children receive efficient full-time education - which doesn't have to be in school.

"In Cambridgeshire, the vast majority co-operate quite happily with us. But there is just a small minority that won't co-operate with us or won't give evidence the child is receiving education, or where we are concerned no-one ever sees the child.

"It is the ones we don't know about that we are worried about."

She added: "We want to co-operate with the parents not work against them."

In his report, Mr Badman said it was "cause for concern" that although around 20,000 home-educated children and young people were known to local authorities, the real number could be more than 80,000.