102 Hague kids home schooled over religious beliefs ordered back to regular school
The city of The Hague will revoke compulsory education exemptions for 102 children who were previously allowed to stay out of school on ideological or religious grounds, forcing them into classrooms after the summer break, Education Alderman Hilbert Bredemeijer told NU.nl.
The move follows a recent Dutch Supreme Court ruling that sharply limits when such exemptions can be granted and comes as national officials consider abolishing the exemption system altogether. The decision makes The Hague the first municipality to act on the ruling, though officials say other cities may follow.
The number of children in The Hague under this exemption has quadrupled in five years. Authorities say it is unclear whether all of them are receiving actual home instruction, noting that there is no formal oversight of homeschooling in the Netherlands.
Under current Dutch rules, parents granted exemptions are responsible for their child’s development, but authorities do not monitor educational outcomes. “These children are simply out of sight,” Bredemeijer told NU.nl. “Perhaps some of them are receiving good homeschooling and are still managing to make friends. But we do not have that certainty, because there is simply no supervision possible.”
The Supreme Court ruled last month that parents can only claim such exemptions if no public school is reasonably accessible. For primary education, “nearby” means within six kilometers, and for secondary education, within 20 kilometers. In The Hague, officials say no child meets that distance threshold from a public school.
However, the ruling did not clearly specify what should happen to children who already have exemptions and reapply annually. That legal ambiguity has left municipalities, the education inspection service, the Public Prosecution Service (OM), and the education sector organization Ingrado in ongoing discussions. Despite this, Ingrado chair Corien van Starkenburg said municipalities are not required to wait for national clarification to act.
Bredemeijer said the ruling is decisive. “In The Hague we have around 200 schools of all shapes, sizes, and denominations,” he told the newspaper. “That should be enough to raise children properly, with qualified teachers and, importantly, a social environment.”
He added that the city will enforce compliance if parents do not enroll their children, which could include referring cases to the OM for prosecution.
