HomeSchooler.org.uk

I just came back from seeing David Laws- he is the Lib-Dems Education minister - Shadow Secretary of State for children, schools and families.

The point of my letter was to point out my objection and I did hand him all the relevant documents which backed up all my concerns

However, knowing full well that what was contained in the letter could never be covered in a half hour session I simply asked him to read it and reference my points back to the Badman review, the 2007 review, current law and statements made by Balls et al.

The actual discussion focused mainly on the right to come into all houses and the differing educational philosophies including autonomy.

He has a good understanding of south Somerset’s LEA and home education as he has visited the home ed centre in Chard. He is already familiar with the issues and opposes any form of dictating what is 'suitable' as long as there is a plan in place. He also said that training is needed to make sure that the councils department in charge and the advisors / inspectors understand autonomy. The important point about whether home ed is included under the Diversity and Equality department and budget as opposed to Education social work/ truancy was very valid.

He also said he would like to see implemented the parts of the review which enables parents who choose to utilise the services offered by schools extended hours, trips, work experience, GCSE etc.

He did however say that seeing as all schools are inspected, so too should educators whose children are not in school but again emphasised he disagrees with changing a parent’s right to choose their philosophy of education.

His main point was that it was possible that out of the unknown 60,000, which he had to agree was a figure not backed by research or evidence, that maybe there were parents who simply never sent their kids to school and who sat them in front of a tv every day and did no education.

He conceded that of the known 20,000 IF there were concerns the law was adequate.
He also realised that if a parent was known for having issues within the school then these issues would be known also to the LEA before deregistration and therefore the law was also adequate.

So basically his concern is with the unknown number of kids never sent to school with whom they have no concerns but because they do not know they exist but that there may be cause for concern. Which is where I pointed out that it is also possible that in the Moslem community there may be unknowns building bombs and planning harm but that hopefully a majority of people would consider it unacceptable to ask all Moslems to be checked just in case.

.....and again he said that all schools are checked and seemed to be comparing like for like -school education and home education - rather than the obvious issue of privacy even though without concerns no-one would argue it was acceptable for all parents to be checked nor all parents whose children are too young to yet reach compulsory education age.

I said that this was true but that still one in five leave primary without having the basic skills the government considers important and that achieving the five outcomes was not possible for all children in schools despite the numerous , costly and laborious checks in place and targets to reach which he agreed was putting teachers off teaching. In fact , he would have to concede that many children are not getting an education in schools which matches their age, aptitude and ability but I forgot to mention this issue for comparison.

I did remember to point out that despite being in school most children who are abused or neglected are missed.

He did not seem to have any safeguarding concerns only educational.

He said he wanted my letter and all the supporting documentation so he could read it on the train back to London.

Just after me happened to be two more people (together) who came from the Home Education Centre in Chard - so I filled them in on what had already been covered and what his point of view was so that hopefully they could hone in on specifics and in particular, funding and the possibility of offering a smorgasbord but only cherry picking the cheaper agenda fitting objectives.