Supporting the education and welfare of the children of Armed Forces families is a specific challenge for schools. Sara Alston describes the challenges these children face and how schools can support them
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There are approximately 174,000 children with a parent working in the British Armed Forces in the UK. However, many schools have no experience of supporting these children, while for others managing and responding to the multiple needs of military families is part of their daily work.

The children of serving military personnel are entitled to the Service Pupil Premium (currently £335 per-pupil, per-year – see DfE, 2023). This is “in recognition of the specific challenges children from service families face and as part of the commitment to delivering the armed forces covenant”. This is fundamentally different to other Pupil Premium funding, which is focused on raising attainment; the service Pupil Premium is mainly for pastoral support.

When we consider the needs and difficulties of military families, we remember that they are not a single, homogenous group. Rank, service and experience impact their lives, as do the wide variety of needs that all children can face – SEND, poverty, English as an additional language, race, class, and so much more.

 

Specific needs

In 2011, Ofsted looked at the outcomes for service children and the provisions made for them. The inspectorate found that military children face unique challenges, such as regular house and school moves and deployment of family members that cause stress and anxiety. This brings a lack of stability with education and friendship groups. At the same time, the protective factors such as wider support networks and good housing are often lacking for these families. The Department for Education reminds us that the impact of “significant life events” means that service children are at particular risk of adverse childhood experiences and mental health problems (DfE, 2018).

 

Mobility

House moves are recognised as a potentially traumatic and significant life event. For children, this involves not only a new house, but usually a new school. Most military personnel move every two years or so, often with little say in when or where they go or what kind of accommodation they will move to. Both the stress of the move and having to settle into a new area is huge. Frequently, as soon as one move is complete, the family starts preparing for the next. The threat and uncertainty of a move can hang over families for years.

Many children experience this multiple times during their school career. This can have an impact on their ability, confidence and willingness to make and maintain friendships. Sometimes they will move as part of a regiment so go with their “army family” – but not always. Some families do consider boarding schools to provide their children with greater stability, but as the MOD makes only a partial contribution towards the cost this is not an option open to all.

 

Parental absence

Even when children move with their serving parent to a new area, it does not mean that the parent will be present. Many military personnel are regularly posted away from their family. Often it is for months at a time, including tours of duty in conflict zones. This can happen at short notice or for an unspecified length of time. Personnel have little control.

Quite apart from the worries about a parent in possible danger, there are additional stresses as contact with the absent parent can be difficult and restricted. 

The parent may only have limited, and often unreliable, internet or phone access – sometimes only during school hours. They may also be restricted in the information they can share during the calls.

Families are often moved to a new area, without support, to have service personnel immediately deployed elsewhere. This produces the “double whammy” of an unfamiliar location with reduced support and an absent parent. This is a particular issue for single-parent families, as the children have to be left in the care of others.

 

Parental return

Many families describe the “stay at home” parent as becoming a single parent in their partner’s absence. This takes a period of readjustment, both when the serving parent leaves and on their return.

Many children and parents experience huge guilt when the return of the service parent is not always the joyful experience they anticipate. For those left behind, they have established routines and relationships that are disrupted and changed. For those returning, they need to adjust to children who have grown and changed during their absence. Also, there is their own readjustment from active service and all that entails.

Additional stresses include issues with the “cult of the military hero” who does not match the reality or expectations of the parent or children at home leading to difficulties for all involved.

 

Instability 

All of this often gives military families’ lives an air of instability. It is difficult for families to plan long-term, including around school transitions.

Often families manage to extend their stay in a particular area until a child reaches a key stage transition, but not always and not for all the children in the family. Children can find themselves without school places as moves happen mid-year and they are forced to leave the area where they completed the application process. 

This affects children’s friendships. Some have moved so frequently that they simply feel that making friends is not worth it. Others know that any friendship may be transitory and so form very intense or very superficial relationships which others can find hard to manage. 

There are pupils who will “self-sabotage” friendships to help deal with them ending and reduce the hurt. Children can develop particular personas to manage these transitions which can in turn inhibit their abilities to form meaningful relations with peers and adults in schools.

Even with the best of intentions maintaining relationships over distance is difficult, particularly for children. This in itself impacts the memories children and families develop of people and places which for children can quickly become confused and unreliable with the consequent mental health concerns.

 

Housing

Sadly, military housing is an on-going scandal. Much of the housing is in poor condition and a shameful state of repair. There are many issues, regarding the allocation of housing (currently according to rank – the higher the rank, the larger the property regardless of need or family size). As far as schools are concerned, many military children will continue to live in inappropriate and sometimes overcrowded housing. This housing often has problems with damp and disrepair.

 

Schools

Frequent school moves not only affect children’s relationships within school, but also their access to the curriculum and wider school life. Children find that they repeat certain topics over and over again, while missing basic foundations in others. Equally parts in school plays and membership of sports teams may go to others as service children can lack confidence, not have the time, or there is a fear that they will soon move on and so spots are given to others to “protect” the rest of the team.

 

Children with special needs

Military children with SEN are particularly affected by frequent school moves as they almost always require a change of local authority. Every area has its own procedures and paperwork, so transfer is not easy. For those who have an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) it can take longer to be placed in a suitable school, even when they are looking for a mainstream placement, as the paperwork cannot be moved until they have an address. Only then can the search for a school place begin. This can lead to weeks or longer out of school.

For those in need of an EHCP the situation is even worse. Despite the promises that military families are given priority and paperwork should be transferable, this is rarely reflected in reality. Often paperwork is begun, but a move means that it is not actioned or completed.

Assessment procedures for SEMH difficulties or neurodiversity are stalled, paperwork can be lost and different procedures, agencies and thresholds mean that this work often has to be repeated or children simply move again before they reach the top of the waiting list. Too often, diagnosis and SEN paperwork are completed multiple times, but the support and provision needed is never put in place.

Even the identification of need is hindered by frequent moves so schools struggle to differentiate between potential SEN as opposed to simple difficulties settling in or a response to other trauma.

The situation is even worse for those moving between countries within the UK or returning to the UK after a period living overseas.

 

Where is the support?

In many ways, the provision of focused support for these children is easier in schools where are a number of military children. Such schools are able to combine their Service Pupil Premium funding to provide additional pastoral or SEMH support for these children. They can set up additional social provision to support friendships and transitions. Further, they develop experience and expertise in these areas and are able to build links with other agencies, both military and civilian, to support their families. But much of this depends on the individual schools, their staff and commitment. It is often easier in primary schools where the numbers are more focused and catchment smaller.

There are a number of governmental and military organisations to support families, such as military welfare and chaplaincy, the Education Advisory Team, and Defence Children Services (see further information) which can signpost families and schools to support. There are also organisations for each military service.

 

Practical strategies

Ultimately, much of the support our military families require depends on the willingness of schools to engage with children and their families in the time that they are with them. This includes proactively supporting transitions when they happen, including the transfer of educational, SEND and safeguarding information so that children are supported with each new start. This should include proactive and timely communication between settings so there is continuity of support.

Transition information should include which parts of any syllabi the child has covered. This is particularly important for children engaged in preparation for tests. The school then needs to work with the children to make up any gaps in the curriculum.

Schools need to support families to ensure that all records from medical services, including CAMHS, are transferred to the new area. Military children are entitled to re-enter the waiting list for these services in their new area at the same position. Sadly, this rarely happens as paperwork is not shared or transferred.

Schools can positively support families with transition by supporting requests to retain quarters, so that while the service personnel move postings, the family stay in the same home and at the same school. This is not appropriate or possible for all personnel, but requests to delay moves to the end of a term or school year can be supportive for some.

Most important is the support and welcome that schools give to children and families when they arrive. Ensuring that both children and parents get a friendly welcome and effective induction to the school.

When children arrive mid-year, it is too easy to forget that they need books, pegs, trays, support to find their way round the building, explanation of the routines, as well as support to maintain friends. A thoughtful, planned induction programme and buddy system makes a huge difference. 

Finally for all our military children, ask parents to share when service personnel are on tour or away for any extended period and ensure that staff are aware, check-in and support. These are hard times and both children and the family benefit from support and extra care. 

 

Headteacher Update Summer Term Edition 2024

This article first appeared in Headteacher Update's Summer Term Edition 2024. This edition was sent free of charge to UK primary schools in May 2024. A free-to-access digital edition is also available via www.headteacher-update.com/content/downloads 

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