Elective Home Education (EHE) is a term used to describe a choice by parents to provide education for their children at home – or at home and in some other way that they choose, rather than sending them to school.
Parents have a responsibility to make sure that their child is educated. Most children attend school for their education, but parents do have the right to educate their child at home. For some families it is a choice made for philosophical, spiritual, or religious reasons and for some it is a choice made to meet a child’s specific needs. Equally, we know that some parents will opt to home educate because there are issues about the educational provision for their child at school.
The term ‘parents’ should be taken to include all those with parental responsibility, including guardians and foster carers and, in the latter case, the local authority may also be a corporate parent.
Cognus have a duty to find out so far as possible whether home educated children are receiving a suitable full-time education, and we report our work to the Department for Education.
Cognus’ Elective Home Education service offers advice and guidance to schools where families wish to, or have, off-rolled their child to home educate.
For more information, the Cognus Inclusion Coordinators can be contacted by email EHE@cognus.org.uk or on 020 4534 1079 / 020 8323 0412
Useful Documents:
EHE assessment Booklet for parents and carers – please open and then download / save to your device to complete, then return to EHE@cognus.org.uk
DfE Elective Home Education – Guidance for Local Authorities