Six families a week turning to home education

The number of parents choosing to home educate continues to rise, council figures show

About six families a week in North Northamptonshire are choosing to home educate their children, its council has said.

North Northamptonshire Council said that in June the number of children taken out of school stood at 1,238, double what it was four years ago.

Its head of inclusion, Annette Perrington, told councillors the reasons were complex but largely fell into three group.

She said some families wanted to home-educate for philosophical or religious reasons, or because they were not satisfied with schools, while others for mental health or wellbeing reasons.

The meeting took place at the Corby Cube

Ms Perrington said carers were choosing "to electively home educate rather than go through that challenge every day".

"Those are the young people we can absolutely support and that's what we need to be looking at."

Parents do not need to inform their local authority they are home-educating and local authorities cannot intervene, unless they have reason to believe there are matters relating to harm or a suitable education is not being offered.

The meeting of the council's children, young persons and education scrutiny committee also heard that suspensions and exclusions in North Northamptonshire was higher than national or regional levels, with a secondary school suspension rate of 21.42 locally, compared to 15.26 nationally.

The most common reason was listed as "persistent disruptive behaviour", the Local Democracy Reporting Service said.

Ms Perrington said: "Some persistent disruptive behaviour may be because of an educational need, in which case you have to look at whether that behaviour is something a young person has a choice over.

"We have to look, and schools have to look and consider, is there any support to the child or to the family that could help before the very big decision to permanently exclude a child has taken place."

The council is looking to have 800 new special educational needs unit places by 2032/33.