A home educator has won her appeal at Listowel Circuit Court against a conviction under the School Attendance Act.
The case against Mrs Christine Best has been in the courts since 1997. It was initially a test case, her solicitor, Mr Pat Enright, informed the court, and had been before the High Court and the Supreme Court as well as before the District Court in Listowel.
Yesterday, Judge Sean O'Leary said he was satisfied that the education being given had reached the minimum standard set down in the Supreme Court judgment.
Mrs Best was first summonsed in July 1997 for the non-attendance of her three children - Niall, William and Hazel - at Dromclough National School near Listowel. She had withdrawn the children in December 1996.
Hazel and Niall later returned to different schools and were now doing very well, the court heard. Proceedings involving them had been dismissed. However, the middle child, William, who was aged 11 and in fourth class at the time, had not returned to school.
Last September in Listowel District Court Mrs Best was convicted and fined £5 under the School Attendance Act.
William had not wanted to return to school, Mrs Best told the court. He was introverted and shy, but had responded well to one-to-one education.
Originally from England, the Bests moved to a smallholding at Stacks Mountain 11 years ago.
Mrs Best said in evidence that she was now following the Junior Cert curriculum with William. She herself had left school at 17, with five O Levels, but had returned to education at the age of 40 and was now in the third year of a four-year distance learning degree programme in complementary medicine.
There was no typical home educator, the court heard from Mr Alan Thomas, a published author on home education. He said that home education had grown over the past 20 years and he estimated that 300 Irish families were now engaged in it.
Judge O'Leary said that he found the concept of the child making the final decision, subject to parental veto, "extraordinary".
After the judgment Mrs Best told reporters: "I have always been confident of my ability to teach children at home, but not of winning the case."
In court, when asked where William was going to go, she replied: "To the university of life, who can say?" He could go on to third-level education, she said.