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Freedom for Children to Grow |
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The Law Relating to
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ContactPoint/Children Missing EducationCONTACTPOINTAs we have been saying in all our home education regional workshops there are two major new government initiatives which will have a huge impact on home educating families.One is the national database, which has variously been called the database or the Information Sharing Index and is now called ContactPoint. You can find more information about the ISI here. ContactPoint will hold basic identifying information for all children in England (aged up to 18): name, address, gender, date of birth and a unique identifying number. The current definition of "basic information" is basic identifying information about the child's parent/carer; educational setting and GP practice. IT professionals have already expressed their horror at the security implications of this national database and you can find more details about this in the EO response to the government consultation. One of the obvious questions is: can we opt out of the system, as we are currently able to do with "The Big Opt Out" from the NHS spine. The current view is that we will not be able to opt out, and that information will be fed in from other databases.
CHILDREN MISSING EDUCATIONThe second government initiative is known colloquially as "Children Missing Education". Following the Education and Inspections Act 2006 your local authority now has to make arrangements to identify children at risk of not receiving education and this category will initially encompass all children whose place of education is not known to the authority. In other words, if your children are not already known to the authority as being home educated then there will be an empty data field for "educational setting" in the ContactPoint database (because "educational setting" counts as "basic identifying information") and this may trigger further investigation from the Children Missing Education team.The government published statutory guidance on this area where it is quite clear that home educated children are NOT "children missing education". The problem is that at a local level many practitioners may not interpret their new duties in the correct way. We believe that what should happen when the authority becomes aware of a blank field in the "education settings" for a particular child is that the Children Missing Education Team will contact the family in writing and enquire as to where the child is being educated. At this point the home educating family has several choices in how they might respond. It remains unclear as to how the authority might become aware of this blank data field. We have previously been told that a registered user will only log onto ContactPoint to check the basic identifying information held for a named individual child when he/she has reason to find out whether other any practitioners are working with a particular child. However it seems possible that the Children Missing Education team might do a speculative trawl in order to compile a list of those children within the authority who have a blank field for "education setting". It also seems possible that the Children Missing Education team or some other person at the local authority might not simply log "home education" on the database, but might further take it upon themselves to "verify" the home education provision by checking back and cross-referencing with a list held by the Home Education team. It is also conceivable that that the CME team might think it is their job to ascertain whether someone is "really" home educating before they log it on the database, or that they might keep the field blank and allocate a Key Worker ( possibly a social worker ) to become involved with the family while the Home Education team makes enquiries. None of these things should happen but we feel that in the current climate they are not impossible. So what can you do about it? You can start to find out more about how the Children Missing Education team will work in your area by telephoning Children's Services at the council, or by putting children missing education + name of council into an internet search engine.
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