At the mercy of crime - how 100,000 teens 'disappear' from school

A new report reveals how an army of "invisible children" has been dumped on the educational scrapheap by the age of 16.

The youngsters include persistent truants, pupils who have been expelled, victims of bullying and children on witness protection programmes.

Others are ill or are caring for sick parents. It is feared many end up simply roaming the streets and risk becoming involved in crime or illegal child labour.

A report from the right-leaning Bow Group think tank showed how 70,000 pupils who should have taken GCSEs last year failed to turn up.

A further 15,000 children in their GCSE year were missing from school registers altogether. Of these, 6,000 had disappeared within a year of their 14th birthdays.

Experts believe that after taking into account younger children, the number of missing pupils stands at 100,000.

The report tells of one case involving a 10-year-old boy from North Wales who went missing from school two years ago, when he was just eight.

He was eventually located but was found to have been working as a drugs runner for criminal gangs.

In another case highlighted by the report, a 15-year-old girl was being so badly bullied she was having panic attacks and was too afraid to return to school.

Ministers were yesterday accused of neglecting low-achievers and driving schools to focus all their efforts on driving up the numbers gaining A* to Cs.

The report, titled Wasted Education, claims that in deprived parts of Manchester, Liverpool, Bristol and Birmingham the number of pupils gaining even a G grade in any kind of exam was falling.

"There are certain groups in society who have fallen so far below the radar that politicians are not aware they exist" said co-author Chris Skidmore.

"These are the lost children. If you compare the number who were at school three years ago and the number who are 16 now, you see them dropping off the rolls fairly dramatically.

"Others never turn up to exams."

Mr Skidmore, who will publish the report this week in a think tank magazine titled Invisible Nation, blamed a "relentless focus upon an academic curriculum" and warned that less able children were being overlooked.

Experts at the Inclusion Trust, which aims to support pupils who have dropped out of the system, put the number of "invisible children" at 100,000.

Professor Stephen Heppell, chair of the trustees, said: "These kids could fill Wembley. There is clearly a sense of crisis.

"The tragedy is that the costs of social deprivation repeating itself over and over are enormous. Even if we only cared about the bank notes, it would still be worth tackling this."

A spokesman for the Department for Education and Skills said: "Record investment, radical reform and the hard work of teacher and pupils have delivered a massive improvement in school standards since 1997.

"Some 86,000 more pupils now achieve five good GCSEs than did in 1997, and more than 81,000 pupils are entered for GCSE exams than were 10 years ago.

"However we are never complacent when it comes to bringing on the talents of all our young people, tackling educational inequality and improving social mobility."