Parents have almost no meaningful agency in their child’s literacy education. They are expected to trust the system, follow the programme at home, and accept whatever level or approach the school has decided on. When they raise concerns, they are often told to keep going with the same method or that their child simply needs more practice. Many parents end up feeling that if progress is slow, it must be because they are doing something wrong.

This power imbalance becomes especially clear when a child’s way of learning does not match the standard pathway. SpLDs, such as dyslexia, are frequently treated as a problem to be fixed rather than a difference in how the brain processes language. To revisit the measuring metaphor, it is like being an inch in a sea of centimetres. The system is built around one set of measurements and assumes everyone will fit. When a child does not, the response is usually to try harder with the same approach, which amounts to shouting "centimetres!" louder.

Even when parents are doing everything the school asks, they can still be made to feel at fault. Being told they are not using the readers correctly, or that they need to do more practice at home, adds a heavy layer of guilt. It shifts the blame onto the parent instead of asking whether the curriculum itself is built for a different kind of learner.

Parents quickly discover how little influence they actually have. They can pay for private assessments and tutoring, but these often have limited impact inside school. They can attend meetings and fill in forms, but real change is slow and uncertain. Even writing to their MP is next to useless. Many families describe feeling helpless unless they have the money and time to fight the system on multiple fronts. Those who cannot do this are left watching their child fall further behind.

This lack of agency is structural. Parents have almost no formal route to influence how literacy is taught or how support is organised. They can vote every few years, but they have little say over curriculum decisions, assessment methods, or the way resources are allocated in their local school. Most schools now operate under the same pressures and expectations, which reduces local flexibility. When parents push for something different, they are often met with the limits of what the system currently allows.

There is also very little formal support for parents who want to advocate. There are almost no dedicated parent advocates inside the system who can help families navigate the process or push for different approaches. SENDIASS, the nearest organisation that parents have, can only offer advice. Parents are largely left to do this work alone, often while holding down jobs and managing family life.

Teachers are also constrained by the same system. They are expected to deliver a consistent programme across large classes while meeting inspection and assessment requirements. Many would like to adapt their teaching for children who need something different, but the structures around them make this difficult. When parents ask for changes, teachers can end up caught between what might help the child and what they are required to do.

The consequences fall hardest on the children. When parents have little power to influence what happens in school, important information about the child is often overlooked. The child continues with methods that do not suit them. Gaps widen. Confidence drops. By the time the system finally acknowledges there is a problem, years can pass, and often do. This is especially damaging for children who needed a different route from the start.

As mentioned in Part 1, education should help every young person become capable and resilient. That is much harder to achieve when the people who know the child best have almost no voice in how they are supported. Parents are not reading specialists, but they are specialists in their own child. A system that treats them as problems rather than partners loses valuable knowledge and leaves too many families feeling powerless. The net result is that you have haggard parents with years of battle scars and zero trust in the system. Woe betide the government that falls afoul of them, as our current one has. To be successful, any sort of reform absolutely must incorporate their feedback, lived experience and undo some of the damage.

Part 3 will look at what becomes possible when parents are treated as genuine partners and the child, the parent, and the educator all have a proper role in shaping how literacy is taught and supported.