The growth of home education in Brent

Readers may have been intrigued by a short piece in the Kilburn Times today about the growth of home education in Brent. This resulted from FoI requests by Oxford Home Schooling.

This is the pattern for the whole of London:

The boroughs that have experienced most growth in the last 10 years are:

1. Newham (686% increase)
2. Hackney(323% increase)
3. Ealing (304% increase)
4. Brent (214% increase)
5. Lewisham (212% increase)

A separate FoI request in June 2016 elicited the following figures from Brent Council. The total across all year groups is equivalent to about 10 classes or slightly bigger than a one form entry primary school but the increase is significant.
 

FOI 5758896: Elective Home Education
School year	Year
	2006	2011	2016
Reception	10	14	2
1	4	11	22
2	6	8	23
3	3	16	26
4	5	8	30
5	9	14	32
6	9	14	29
7	6	10	34
8	8	12	27
9	20	9	25
10	12	9	23
11	0	2	16
Total	92	127	289

Home educators I have spoken to have varying reasons for educating their children at home ranging from children with special needs who cannot cope with a school environment to parents who disagree with the current stress on high stakes testing and the narrowing of the curriculum.

The legal position is that education is compulsory but schoooling is not. Read more HERE

Once your child is registered at a school attendance is compulsory.