Alow Us Our Freedom

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Michaela ThomaGledhill

In this world we walk, Onward, in our line. Never daring to step foot, outside the confines of our minds. We look around and see our land, but in our own blind way, Our minds will only see, the lies that we portray. Blind and deaf to all the things that we refuse to know, unaware of the truth, in story’s madmen sew. Are we free? Or forced, by unseen hands? To implement the chaos, of the puppeteers plans? Do we have the right to choose, what we do or say, where we go and what we think or is it all the same? We watch our backs in fear, distrust is all we know, Guilty until proven innocent, or so the phrase should go. Wearing masks of smiles and scripted words till this is all we are, not people endorsed to be themselves, but androids that bleat and baa. Often it is thought, that teaching’s what we need, but those who learn off script, are those who should be freed.

By Michaela ThomaGledhill. Age 15.

2009.

Hello Needless to say, this is in response to the Badman review of home education.

http://www.pdfcoke.com/doc/22239312 My name is Michaela Thoma-Gledhill I am a member of the home educated youth council, HEYC, https://heyc.org.uk/ but I write this independent of my group. over the months of the Badman review I have written many letters to the DCSF and other forms of authority in the matter, I was there when HEYC visited and was turned away by a member of the DCSF’s staff after waiting hours for a meeting on the 30th of July http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=wOkaQmZdjks and I regrettably could not make the meeting on the 12th of august since I was away, but I have been told that this meeting had as little effect as I am used to getting through emails. My point is that I might just as well go stand outside and yell at my shed as write letters and try to get responses from any forms of authority in this matter. I have written many letters, emails, facts and figures against the Badman review, as have most of the other home educators that I know, none of them have gotten so much as a response, and even if they did I doubt it would be more than the usual robotic, computer generated, copy and pasted reply that makes me doubt very much that it has even been read. I also would like to point out that in Graham Badman’s most recent letter requesting more evidence from LA's he states that "most of my recommendations have not been challenged" I found this completely outrageous as to the best of my knowledge EVERY home educator completely rejected ALL of his recommendations. Also he goes on to say that "however, a small group of home educators have refused to accept my conclusion that 'the number of children known to children's social care in some local authorities is disproportionately high relative to the size of the home educating population'" Again he said a SMALL group of home educators complained, it was to my knowledge the ENTIRE population of HE. also he requested more evidence to provide more statistically rigorous information to the select committee, this implies to me that he has made recommendations on statistics that are not rigorous, which is the entire point of having the enquiry. I also notice that we had till the 22nd of September to hand in submissions to the select committee whereas Graham had until the 1st of October. And in my opinion, once at the select committee they seemed much less accommodating to the home educators who were speaking, and I would like to point out I found that Mr. Barry Sheerman was completely bias against the home educators, cutting them off, asking the wrong questions, Sheerman also kept on cutting off Mr. Graham Stuart’s questions, which were perhaps the only points that we could have responded to fairly, we were not listened to and the meeting was too short to really cover what needed to be covered and he was more abrupt when talking to us than the others. The select committee’s job is to challenge people’s statements, and they must be completely neutral to do so. If you ask me they were in no way completely neutral. And as far as the review itself goes I won’t bore you with facts and figures about how his recommendations illegal and that he is wrong about his claims, because I’m sure that most people have already covered this, I include myself in this statement, and having done so I can see that it has no effect. As I’ve seen the same robot-like responses to every persons letters, pleas, explanations and so on. No-one bothers to listen to reason when they believe they are right. But what the recommendations suggest is ridiculous. Right of entry to our houses? Yearly goals? Yearly registration? A forced curriculum? And beginning to define a suitable education? What it proposes in other words is we turn home education into a school. And you can say it is because of the worry of child abuse and the voice of children all you want, but the figures were checked, home education is NOT a cover for child abuse and yes one or two cases might be so, but the same goes for school and any child, it does not matter how their

educated and someone willing to abuse their own child in the first place will not mind the minor offence of not registering so this will get you nowhere. However, as I have previously stated; logic and legality do not seem to matter in our arguments, so my argument is not that it’s illegal, but that it is wrong. It is wrong to force people into a society they do not fit into. It is wrong to try and change people’s beliefs into your own. It is wrong to think that because something is different it is bad. So what if we are different? I am home educated and school educated children are very different to me, but I would never say that school is worse than home education, that I was right and they were wrong, education is different for different people there is no defined right or wrong, as long as your learning it doesn’t matter which way you do it. I believe that we should be left as we are, the results have so far been decent if not brilliant and our existence does not harm anyone so I beseech you, leave us be, let home educators continue living as we do, without having to fight to keep it so. If you wish to respond to this my email is on my profile.