Education is compulsory for children in England, but schooling is not. Parents are legally entitled to provide an education for their children at home. This is often known as home schooling, though in policy terms, the Department for Education uses the phrase “elective home education”.

The inclusion of the word “elective” in government terminology implies that home education is a matter of parental preference. Some parents do home educate as a result of their lifestyle, preferences or philosophy. But this only tells part of the story.

The number of home-educated children has risen rapidly in recent years. This has happened against a backdrop of mounting pressure within the education system, including a special educational needs and disabilities system in crisis and record levels of persistent school absence.

Mental health is now the most reported reason for home educating – eclipsing lifestyle and philosophical or preference-based motivations. General dissatisfaction with school, as well as dissatisfaction with school for children with special educational needs and disabilities, also rank among the five most frequently recorded reasons.

Our new research helps to explain how these pressures shape the decisions of families to withdraw from the school system. We worked with 18 home-educated young........

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