Louis, 9, rocks back and forth. He can draw the solar system and place every planet on it, but he will not meet your gaze and a high-pitched voice will have him clap his hands to his ears in agony.
Louis’s parents recognised his autism early on and sought a referral to a specialist from their GP. Early diagnosis – and a middle-class postcode – has helped them seek prompt speech and occupational therapy for their son. This came with guidance for Louis’s parents on navigating the unfamiliar bureaucracy of special needs education: how to obtain a needs assessment from the council; ensure Louis received an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan that met his needs; enrol him in the local primary school.
Many tiger mothers (and fathers) feel they have no option but to keep their child safely at home
More than 70 per cent of autistic children are, like Louis, enrolled in a mainstream school. But, shockingly, a recent survey has found that one in six did not go back to school in September. Families blamed their children’s anxiety, exhaustion, and sensory overload for the decision to keep them at home. According to government statistics, during the 2024-25 school year, more than 28 per cent of the 166,000 children with autism in England were persistently absent. The figures also show that 5.5 per cent of autistic pupils missed 50 per cent or more of their time in school, five times more than those without special needs. However, for almost 30,000 children to have decided not to even start school last September marks a new record.
This rings alarm bells among educationalists and policy-makers: school socialises, raises aspirations, and broadens horizons. It equips children with the skills needed for life, as well as employment. This holds ever truer today, when many parents expect school to deliver potty training, exercise routines, and lessons in hygiene, such as how to clean their teeth. The Children’s Commissioner, Dame Rachel de Souza, said:
Children tell me how much they value school as places to learn and be with their friends, but when they need extra support to attend and engage, they want this to be easily accessible and available in one place, ideally in school.
Parents with autistic children agree. But they also share, in chatrooms and on platforms such as Ambitious about Autism and Not Fine in School, their unique concerns. Making sure a child is alright, let alone thriving, can prove difficult when so often they are non-verbal or uncommunicative. Bullying classmates, frustrated teachers, attainment-focused heads – parents of children with autism cannot adopt a ‘this will build our child’s resilience’ approach to such issues. An unpleasantness that would cast a shadow over their school day for a child without special needs can crush their SEND classmate for weeks – or trigger disruptive behaviour that no school is likely to tolerate for long.
Many tiger mothers (and fathers) feel they have no option but to keep their child safely at home. The boom in home schooling has made this easier. An industry has sprung up to cater for families opting out of formal education, with free or inexpensive teaching resources – even the BBC has produced its own free Makaton resources for parents and a website for children. Meanwhile, for those with deep pockets, firms like MyTutor offer tailored support for children with autism (and ADHD, dyslexia and dyspraxia) from £49 per lesson.
An increasing number of parents feel even more let down or downright hostile because they have had to take on their child’s school over their legal entitlement to special support. According to the Ministry of Justice, the number of cases with SEND parents going to tribunal had soared to 15,000 by last September. Over 90 per cent of these hearings are won by parents; as such, families may be forgiven for suspecting schools of operating in bad faith.
The charity Parenting Circle works to improve parental engagement. It has found that a hereditary element also plays a part in this conflict. ‘We know that autism is highly hereditary, with 80 per cent of cases showing some genetic factors, so it’s likely that SEND parents experienced their own challenges in school,’ Angela Dickinson chair of the Parenting Circle charity warns.
Bringing these parents alongside (especially at key transition points) to support their children must be an absolute priority and this requires serious, long-term and committed engagement strategies.
Parents fear worse is in store with the publication this month of the government’s long-postponed white paper on SEND provision. Backbench MPs have warned that they will not accept any watering down of current provision, but parents fear Bridget Phillipson’s review will cut corners, stint on support, and narrow the definition of ‘SEND’ to limit eligibility. The Children’s Commissioner is on side:
Schools and services need to be thinking more creatively about how to reengage children who have been absent, working closely with families to understand their lives and needs.
For some parents, the white paper will come too late: they, and their children, have already opted out.
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