Legal threats make NSW school refusal families Australia’s ‘most distressed’
Families dealing with children who refuse to go to school claim they’re being terrorised with prosecution threats while waiting months for homeschooling approval.
Parents in NSW struggling with kids who refuse to go to school claim they are being terrorised by the Education Department over the issue, as advocates call for legislative reform to compulsory schooling.
School Can’t Australia director Tiffany Westphal said families experiencing school refusal in NSW are “some of our most distressed nationally”, subjected to threatening phone calls from school principals and legal letters from the department.
Ms Westphal, who is a social worker by trade, said the issue lay with the Education Act, which states it is a parent’s duty to ensure their school-aged child is attending a school or registered to homeschool, and they can be fined up to $11,000 for failing in that duty.
However, as revealed in the NSW Auditor-General’s latest report, the registration process for homeschooling takes 65 days on average and can take up to three months.
“The process that the NSW government uses is quite scary … and the legislation needs to change,” Ms Westphal said.
“Threats don’t work – they just escalate distress.
“Nationally, we need to be curious about why people are finding school so distressing, and stop thinking of (school refusal) as a behavioural issue – and stop worrying about attendance figures.”
Mid-north coast mum Zoe Barby is one of the many families to have received letters from the department after her son, who was homeschooled for two years before Ms Barby attempted to move him back into a mainstream school, stopped attending due to mental health concerns.
His medical certificate was not accepted, Ms Barby said, and she was bounced between department staff for months.
“During these periods the department of ed and school wanted to have meetings to work out what could be done to support my son in going back to mainstream, even though I applied for homeschooling,” she said.
“I also sent emails advising of homeschool registration and (got) no reply back.”
In one of the letters provided to The Saturday Telegraph, Ms Barby was told “you may wish to access legal advice” and if she didn’t “work with us to find solutions” the department may take “further action”, including court orders and prosecution.
“It was escalated to a Secretary’s meeting – if I didn’t agree or attend, it would have been off to court,” Ms Barby said.
“The whole situation was very traumatic for us all … I was only doing what was best for my son’s mental and physical health.”
Sydney Home Education Network president Vivienne Fox has been homeschooling her own kids for the past 25 years, and said she has also heard numerous reports from families receiving similar threats.
“It’s appalling, and not supportive of these families,” she said.
“For Department staff to say that (a) medical certificates (is) not accepted is completely inappropriate – they are not qualified.”
The Education Act even provides a provision for such circumstances, she said, with medical conditions listed as a “defence to a prosecution” in the legislation.
The NSW Department of Education has been contacted for comment.
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Originally published as Legal threats make NSW school refusal families Australia’s ‘most distressed’
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