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The independent review of home education 27/Jul/2009 A number of people have emailed me or sent me messages about Graham Badman's independent review of home education, so I thought it might be useful to post some information on the review and what I think of it. We published Graham Badman’s report on his review of home education on 11 June 2009 and our initial response the same day. I asked Graham Badman to carry out the review in the light of certain high profile cases and because local authorities and other organisations were consistently raising concerns with my Department about the current state of the law and policy in this area.
I thought it crucial that the review found the appropriate balance between two important principles, and I believe Graham Badman achieved this: giving parents the right to decide how and where their children should be educated; and ensuring that every child is safe and gets the education they need to help them fulfil their potential.
Home education is a well-established and important part of our education system. Both the review and our response reaffirmed our support for its continuation, while also stressing the importance of these principles being put into practice in every area of the country.
The review recommended that the home education framework should be strengthened significantly, and in two different respects: first, by acting to address the small but worrying minority of cases where home educated children have suffered harm because safeguarding concerns were either not picked up at all or were not addressed with sufficient urgency. We are taking the review’s recommendations forward in this area by legislating at the first possible opportunity this year.
Secondly, the review called for access to extra support for those home-educated children who need it, including the relatively high proportion of these children with special educational needs and others who require services they would otherwise receive through school. The review stressed the importance of ensuring that all children receive the kind of high quality education they need to succeed, with local authorities providing the right level of support to home educators to enable them to offer this to children. We made it clear in our initial response that we accepted these recommendations in principle and would set out in the autumn how we intend to take them forward.
I believe that Graham Badman’s review is fair and balanced and I am confident that it sets out a path for keeping home-educated children safe and for strengthening the quality of education they receive, while respecting parents’ rights to choose to home educate, if they wish to do so. For these reasons I think the outcomes of the review are good news for children who are home-educated and for their parents.
More information, including a copy of the report itself and the government's initial response, can be read at: http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters/ete/independentreviewofhomeeducation/irhomeeducation/
A formal consultation on the proposed registration and monitoring arrangements for home education arising from the review is open until Monday 19th October and can be accessed via:
Information on the select committee's inquiry into the review can be found on the Children, Schools and Families select committee website. |
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