The hundreds of Swindon children 'forced' into being educated at home
Ink Education Focus
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“I have 100% been forced into home education. My daughter’s classed as ‘elected home educated’ but it’s not a choice”
Record numbers of children are now being educated at home, and for families like the Kysons who we talk to below, home education has had a huge impact.
The number of children being educated at home is rising across the country. Department for Education statistics show that during the 2022-23 summer term, around 97,600 children were home-educated, with around 490 children voluntarily taught at home in Swindon.
Separate figures from the Office of the Schools Adjudicator suggest that there were 60,500 in March 2019, so the data demonstrates that the number of home-educated children has increased significantly since the coronavirus pandemic.
Amanda Wilkins reports…
Looking at the dates, it would appear the reason for the increase must be related to Covid 19. Did parents and children across the country realise that their enforced stint at home education was in fact beneficial, thus causing the large rise? Are families still fearful of the virus and its effects four years on?
According to statistics, however, Covid is not the cause of this surge away from traditional schooling. The most prevalent reason for children being withdrawn from schools was philosophical, which 15,800 parents had chosen to do.
The second most prevalent reason listed for elective home educating was to protect children’s mental health, with 12,200 parents across England citing this as the explanation.
Home Educating is something that is currently very relevant from a personal perspective.
My youngest is currently in Year 6 at a mainstream primary school. She has Autism (ASD) Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and Type 1 Diabetes. Her complex profile means that she requires constant one-to-one support in school. Mainstream is not the right place for her but unfortunately, as is the case for many children with additional needs, diagnosis and support came too late to secure a place in a SEND (Special Educational Needs and Disabilities) setting.
Her school are fantastic, they do an amazing job, but all the staff are not always given adequate training, and they don’t have the resources and funds to consistently meet her complicated needs. This leads to a very bumpy journey for all involved. We are currently going over a particularly large bump (more of a mountain to be honest). She is struggling massively and has decided that a hunger strike is the way to go. This means not eating at school and with Type 1 Diabetes, the situation has the potential to become life-threatening. I am currently having to pick her up at midday which is far from ideal.
What are the options? Realistically it’s too late to move her to another school, with only a year left of primary she would not settle, and it would be too disruptive. In my opinion her current school is as good as a mainstream can get in terms of SEND support, and we would not find a place in an additional needs primary - there are no spaces.
My only real option would be to home educate. I do not want to home educate. Lockdown taught me that it does not work for our family, but I know of many SEND families who have been left with no alternative. I was left with no option when my son was 11 and I had to remove him from school. Although we did eventually find a place in a SEND school, the psychological damage was done and he left school in year 10 with no GCSEs. I do not want to go down this path for a second time.