Home-schooling on the rise and most pupils unlikely to sit GCSEs

Nicholas Thomas – Local democracy reporter

Nearly 200 GCSE-age children across a county borough are not likely to sit exams because they are being home-schooled.

A Caerphilly County Borough Council report shows just 7% of the borough’s GCSE-age children who receive an elective home education (EHE) will be entered for the qualifications this year.

Home-schooling is on the rise in Caerphilly – up 11% in the past year – and has nearly trebled in popularity across Wales since 2019.

There are currently 451 EHE children in the borough, of whom nearly half would be in Year 10 or Year 11 if they were in school.

At a meeting of the council’s education committee, on Tuesday June 2, members heard councils – acting as local education authorities – have very limited powers to intervene in home-schooling or set curriculum standards.

Melanie Archibald, a senior advisory teacher, told the committee the council expects parents to teach literacy and numeracy, show progress is being made, and provide opportunities to socialise in their wider community.

“It’s quite broad – we have to be mindful it’s the parents’ choice how they educate their children,” she said.

But the council’s role is effectively limited to “signposting” parents towards resources and exam preparation materials, the committee heard.

Ms Archibald said councils have “no control over” how home-schooling is provided, and while the local authority is “extremely mindful” of children’s welfare, she said “EHE in itself is not considered a safeguarding risk”.

Some committee members expressed concerns about the pupils not sitting national exams.

“Are we satisfied that young people being educated at home are not being disadvantaged in terms of qualifications or future opportunities?” asked Cllr Teresa Heron.

“We have no control over what the outcomes for those young people would be,” replied Ms Archibald. “Whether we’re satisfied or not, I think, is a difficult one to answer, but it’s essentially something we have no control over.”

Keri Cole, the council’s director of education, expressed reservations about the rise of home-schooling, and said she was “not comfortable with 93% of Key Stage 4 not sitting exams”.

“I think the danger here is that if we make this very comfortable and very easy to manage, we run the risk of more children becoming EHE,” she said. “That isn’t something we particularly want to see. It’s a balance between doing the best for those children – because it’s not the children who make the decision, it’s the families – with the needs of the other pupils in our care.”

Where EHE parents fall short in their teaching, councils can step in with guidance or enforcement.

But Ms Cole said punishing parents was a “very contentious” issue, with Welsh councils offering “mixed” views on matters such as fines.

“We keep going back with more information, more allowances, because we don’t want to press a nuclear button and alienate them completely,” she said of the approach in Caerphilly.

“Some authorities have gone down the road of issuing orders, fining families… and telling them they have to return to school.

“We’ve got no right to see the child, but we have a right to request an explanation of the education.”

The committee also heard 15 EHE children returned to mainstream education this year, which was roughly twice the number of returning pupils from the previous year.

Ms Archibald said that despite concerns there had been “really positive examples” of at-home education.

“For some children, this is a really positive choice and we do have to respect the rights of parents to take this option”, she said, adding that mainstream education “doesn’t work” for all young people.