Schooling

The Dutch government is required to provide all kids education appropriate to their needs. This ensures that the government provides a variety of educational support for all types of students based on their specific needs rather than cookie cutter educational institutes.

Home Schooling

By law, children aged 5-18 years old are required to attend school. As such home schooling is not an available option (baring some very clearly delineated exceptions that will need to be reviewed by your local municipality/gemeente).

International Schools

There are a number of international schools in the Netherlands. These are paid for education and are often expensive.

Dutch Schools

Schools are divided in public, special (religious), and general-special (neutral) schools. Dutch schools tend to be small and local. There should be multiple school options within a 20 minute walk in most built up areas. The quality of education is also fairly uniform and there isn't the same attempt at getting your kids into "the good school" that is common in the USA.

All schooling provided by the Dutch government is free. This includes all forms of special needs.

There an excellent breakdown on how Dutch schools work available on Wikipedia which is well worth the read.

Breakdown

Schools are broken down into 3 specific age groups:

Basisschool (elementary school) for groups 1-8 (which roughly translates from kindergarten to grade 6 in the USA or 4-12 year old children).
Middelbaarschool (secondary school) for kids roughly 12-18 years old.
Vocational or Higher Education for kids roughly 16 years and older.

Each school is further broken down along these lines:

Religion - Specific religion/denomination or agnostic.
Pedagogy - The method of teaching the school embraces (e.g.: Montessori, Dalton, Jenaplan, Steiner/Waldorf).
Education Levels - Covered further down.
Immersion support - Whether they provide integration support for older children who don't yet know Dutch.
Bilingual support - Whether the school offers education in English and in Dutch (limited to larger cities).
Special education support - Whether the school caters to special needs, what types of needs (ADHD, Autism, PTSD, Down's syndrome, etc) and what level of support they offer (educational or care).

Educational Levels

One of the more confusing parts of the Dutch education system is the concept of school streams in Middelbaarschool. When children reach grade 8 they are graded on a standardized test called the Cito test. This helps the school advise the student on which type of Middelbaarschool to attend:

VMBO - pre-vocational education
HAVO - higher general continued education
VWO - preparatory scientific education

There is an entire flowchart of how students can move between these groups and into subsequent studies and a much more complete breakdown is available (with diagrams) here.

Applying for School

Special Needs

Jeugdgezondheidszorg (youth health care) is the responsibility of the Gemeente (Municipality). Your local municipality should have a service provider you can contact for support. For example, this is the Utrecht's Jeugdgezondheidszorg support contact.

First you will need a formal diagnosis for the child.

Then you can speak with the municipality you are registered at. They will work with you to review the available schooling options and, with the schools, identify which best suits the needs of your child.

If the school is far enough away from your house (further than a comfortable bicycle ride for the child) or if your child needs special support in transport, you can request a taxi service from your municipality to provide them with transport.