East Sussex

 

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EHE consultation response Comment: News:

 

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EHE consultation response

 

copied below is the response as sent to AHEd, but see DCSF files page and scroll down to pdf file five where you will find response 32 on pages 10-20 from East Sussex County Council which includes 2 case studies, only one of which  was given to AHEd by the LA.

 

Response:

 

Local Authority

East Sussex Children’s Services Authority

 

1 Do you agree that it is helpful for the DfES to issue guidelines to local authorities?

 

Yes

 

Comments:

We consider that most local authorities would welcome clear guidance in line with the Every Child Matters and Safeguarding agenda. Current legislation as set out in the guidance without clear definitions of ‘suitable’, ‘full-time’ and whether LAs should take steps to gather evidence of educational progress unless alerted to concerns that an appropriate education is not being provided, would be helpful.

 

The expectations of inspectors recently assessing our LA that Home Education should be monitored regularly and that data should be kept on the GCSE results of Home Educated children suggests that clarity is not currently

in place and these guidelines appear not to provide greater clarity over these issues.

 

2 Do you agree that the description of the law (paragraphs 2.1-2.3) relating to elective home education is accurate and clear?

 

Yes

 

Comments:

As the response form from the Association for Welfare Management states ‘The description of the law is accurate as it stands. However, while the law states that “no person shall be denied the right to education” in practice there is no mechanism to seek the young person’s views. Recent DfES research demonstrates the benefits of seeking the voice of the child. The document describes education law but compromises the welfare of the child, particularly by not addressing the Every Child Matters agenda.’

 

We agree with the above and endorse that LAs are encouraged to seek the opinions, feelings and views of young people in most other matters.

 

3 Do you agree that the description of local authorities’ responsibilities (paragraphs 2.5-2.11) is accurate and helpful?

 

No

 

Comments:

The description does not clarify what the department’s expectation of LAs is. That children and young people should  take ‘reasonable (educational) progress’ is a premise with which we agree but how that is to be established when LAs have no statutory duty in relation to monitoring the quality of home education on a routine basis’ is a taxing concept, especially when they ‘can intervene if they have good reason to believe parents are not providing a suitable education’ .It is not clear from the guidelines whether LAs should do anything in relation to Home Education unless they receive evidence that it is not appropriate.

 

The experience of this authority is that we are contacted about the unsatisfactory nature of educational provision only in the case of acrimonious situations between ex partners.

 

It is particularly perplexing to try to establish exactly what the expectation on LAs is, when the law stands as described and yet LA inspectors ask whether we keep data on the educational attainment in relation to GCSE passes for Home Educated CYP and what we do to ensure safeguarding in this area.

 

4 Do you agree that the section on contact with the local authority (paragraphs 3.4-3.7) is accurate and helpful?

 

No

 

Comments:

The response from Association for Education Welfare Management reflects our views here. There have been concerning cases relating to the ECM agenda and safeguarding within our LA.

 

Please see attached case study which demonstrates some of our concerns. [AHEd comment - case study reproduced below]

 

5 Do you agree that the section on providing a full-time education (paragraphs 3.11-3.14) – and in particular, the characteristics of provision (paragraph 3.13) – is accurate and helpful?

 

No

 

Comments:

3 11 states the current position accurately but does not assist in clarifying how LAs should assess the education provided in the light of 3.12 which implies that LAs should be ‘consider(ing) provision’ of home educating families when previously it has been indicated that LAs need to have concerns before doing so.

 

6 Do you agree that the section on developing relationships (section 4) is useful?

 

Not Sure

 

Comments:

The proposed guidance is not clear whether these contacts should be for all families or just those where concerns have been raised.

 

Within our authority considerable attempts have been made to develop good relationships including meeting with the leaders of local groups of home educators and making more regular visits to families who genuinely seem to want to home educate but need support and guidance to do so. If we were meeting with families only when alerted to concerns, these relationships would be at risk.

 

7 a) Are the suggested resources in section 5 and appendix 2 useful?

 

Comments:

At present Flexi-schooling is not encouraged within our LA. In our guidelines it is stated that this is an arrangement between the family and the school at which the child is on roll. Schools are encouraged to consider any such requests on the grounds of how such arrangements will promote educational progress and school standards at the end of key stages. As a result of this, currently the monitoring of any such arrangements is not carried out by the authority. It would be extremely difficult to determine whether a child’s progress under such an arrangement was as a result of work done at school or as part of a flexible arrangement. The inclusion of flexi schooling in the guidance could encourage greater numbers of parents to consider it. In our LA, the only recent example of a request to do so was when a class was had a job-share teaching pair and the family did not like one of the job-share partners and therefore wanted to educate their child at times when that teacher had responsibility for the class.

 

7 b) Should any other contacts be included?

 

 

8 Please use this space for any other comments you wish to make about the guidelines

 

Comments: The issuing of guidelines provides an opportunity for clarity in the area of elective home education. Unfortunately there still seems to be lack of day to day practical guidance about how the ECM and safe-guarding agendas can be put in place whilst working within the law as it currently stands. Many LAs, ourselves included, tend to rely on the good will of many parents in allowing monitoring to take place or their lack of knowledge about what LAs are legally able to do in this area.

 

Aspirations about how LAs should work with local parent groups and provide information to Home Educating families does not sit well with Section 437(1) of the Education Act 1996, which states that LAs can only intervene if they have good reason to believe that parents are not providing a suitable education. How this can be established without duties to monitor home education has always been the challenge here and often parents challenge any attempts of LAs to find out about the education they are providing because they know that there are no statutory duties in relation to monitoring the quality of home education on a routine basis.

 

END

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The case study referred to in response to Q4 was received after a further FOI request and is copied here:

 

"A family with four children from a Black Minority Ethnic background who were purported to be educating at home. The two older children had been in

schools but had been withdrawn to educate at home and two younger children who had never been in school.

 

Family avoided all contact with services for the children and General Practitioner was the only real contact but this was in terms of parents needs

not those of the children.

 

When the Local Education Authority tried to use the legal process and also involve social care, the parent accused the LEA of not taking his religious and cultural needs into account. Social care then closed the case.

 

No agency had access to the children for long periods of time and the Education Welfare Service worked through the court procedures following the

school attendance order procedure.

 

The case was eventually referred as a child protection issue by a number of professionals, and the police visited and removed the children to a place of safety. The conditions in which they found the children were appalling, and neither child was receiving education or adequate care. The older two were now adults, but were removed to a secure hospital as there were concerns about their vulnerability.

 

Eventually the two younger children were placed on a full care order in foster care and began to thrive, although the youngest has severe developmental delay and special educational needs. The whole process took a number of years and it is not possible to assess whether the difficulties currently experienced were caused or aggrevated by the length of time he remained in the parents’ care."

 

 

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