Every child deserves an education: support online schools for EBSA children

Thousands of children are locked out of education

Mainstream schools and Local Authorities are struggling to meet the educational needs of the substantial number of pupils recorded as persistently absent (nearly 1 in 5 according to government statistics for the academic year 2023/24 (1) ). Many of these children are experiencing emotionally based school avoidance (EBSA), which prevents them attending school for reasons connected with their neurodivergence and/or mental health difficulties, such as anxiety and depression (2) . These children are not lazy truants – they want to learn, but because their mainstream schools cannot meet their needs, they are left isolated and missing out on months or years of education while their wellbeing plummets.

Support, if offered at all, is often completely inadequate. Children are left at home with little or no access to work or put in “student support” or “SEN hubs”, where they do worksheets and receive no teaching – far from accessing the broad curriculum available to their peers.

The impact on families advocating for their children in a system that doesn’t understand them is profound. As schools cannot help, parents have to fill the gaps. Many parents reduce their working hours or leave employment altogether to support their child, and the stress and exhaustion of fighting for access to a suitable education affects every member of the family.

The case for online school

Accredited online schools (3) use proven innovations in education practice and technology to bring learning to children. They are a viable alternative to mainstream schools, with comparable GCSE and A-level results. However, the current pathway to online schooling is long and difficult and only those who can afford it or those with forward thinking professionals on their side are able to benefit. This is clearly unfair and puts many vulnerable children at even greater risk of disadvantage.

This picture could be very different if young people unable to attend mainstream school had the same access to education as everyone else, via DfE accredited online school. Thousands of children could have transformed learning experiences, improved mental health and work prospects.

Education at an accredited online school could kick in at the point of need, providing a temporary solution that offers the breathing space a child needs for their mental health to improve or allows their mainstream school to put effective reasonable adjustments in place. For others, it offers a full-time solution that gives the student a chance to gain qualifications and move onto further education, training or employment.

Early intervention restores children’s prospects and wellbeing.

School absence rates continue to rise – behind the statistics are young people seeing their education, opportunities and mental health slipping away. Action must be taken now before any more damage is done.
DfE accredited online schools present a viable and immediately available solution that is simply not being used to its full potential to help address persistent absence. Online schooling could provide thousands more absent pupils with access to a suitable full-time education and pastoral support that meets their needs and capabilities – as is their right.

The necessary ingredients are in place to make online schools more widely available – they are effective, affordable, accredited by the Government and demand for them is growing. Online education may not be the whole answer, but it can form an integral part of an innovative and
flexible future education system that benefits at least some of those who do not thrive in a mainstream school environment.

We are calling on the Department for Education to establish an efficient pathway that offers families a DfE accredited online school of their choice if their child’s needs cannot be met in mainstream school. We believe this could be implemented quickly by adapting relevant DfE guidance to recognise the legitimacy of accredited online education providers as a readily
available solution to help get more persistently absent children back to education.

If you’d like to support this campaign further by writing to your MP then you can download a template email here: www.voiceforlearners.online.

REFERENCES

1. 1.4 million state-funded pupils (19.2%) were recorded as persistently absent from school during 2023/24, missing 7 or more days across a term. This is close to double the pre-pandemic figure (10.5%). Severe absence, pupils missing 50% or more of school sessions, is growing year-on-year: 158,000 pupils fell into this category in 2023/24, compared to 139,000 in 2022/23.
https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/pupil-absence-in-schools-in-england
2. A recent study found that 92% of EBSA children were neurodivergent (83% were autistic).
Irrespective of neurotype, 94% experienced significant emotional distress, including anxiety, depression and self-harm – Connolly, S. E., Constable, H. L., & Mullally, S. L. (2023). School distress and the school attendance crisis: a story dominated by neurodivergence and unmet need. Frontiers in psychiatry, 14, 1237052.
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychiatry/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1237052/full
3. The DfE’s online education accreditation scheme (OEAS) is the equivalent of an Ofsted inspection for online schools. A list of accredited online schools is available on the ‘get information about schools’ gov.uk website when you filter ‘establishment type’ by ‘online provider’.