Luna Wong, a 16-year-old from Hong Kong, died by suicide in London in July 2023, ten months after moving to the UK to study for her A-levels at Wrekin College in Shropshire. Her parents, Hilda Leong and Thomas Wong, say the system of private education guardians and summer programmes failed to keep her safe, and they are calling for statutory regulation of the sector.
A fresh start that ended in tragedy
Luna had struggled with her mental health since 2019, when political unrest in Hong Kong and Covid lockdowns confined her to her bedroom. She was diagnosed with depression and anxiety, and prescribed a heavy combination of medications. In 2022, she decided to move to the UK for a fresh start, and her parents, after consulting her psychiatrist, agreed. They cashed in Thomas's pension to pay for the school fees.
Luna arrived at Wrekin College in September 2022. She struggled to adjust, sleeping in class and spending time in the school's wellbeing centre. In September, she told a nurse she had previously self-harmed and experienced suicidal thoughts, but this history, along with her ADHD diagnosis, had not been disclosed to the school.
A guardianship system under strain
Thomas and Hilda appointed an education guardian from the White House Guardians agency, but the guardian did not make contact with Luna. When the school rang to arrange a homestay, the guardian said the agency's host families were not trained to look after a pupil with mental health difficulties. The guardian did not offer to visit or find another solution.
The safeguarding review into Luna's death found that the education guardian, who was later appointed, did not convey to her parents that Luna had voiced thoughts of ending her life, and on one occasion gave them a false reason for a host family not wanting to take her back. The guardian also hired Luna's host to provide counselling, billing the parents at a higher rate than she paid the counsellor, and was paid a commission by InvestIN for referring Luna to a summer course.
Summer course and death
In July 2023, Luna attended a two-week residential summer course in London called the Young Psychologist Summer Experience, run by InvestIN, which cost £6,740. The education guardian did not disclose Luna's mental health problems until just before the course began, and did not mention that she had been flown home six weeks earlier due to her deteriorating mental health. InvestIN did not have processes in place for medication, and Luna was given her drugs to handle herself.
Luna was unhappy almost immediately, and told her counsellor she wanted to leave. When she did not turn up for sessions on 12 July, staff knocked on her door but left when there was no answer. It was only around 3pm the next day that another staff member found her dead. She had taken an overdose of prescription medication, and had been undiscovered for more than 40 hours.
Calls for regulation
The coroner concluded that Luna died by suicide, and flagged that she had never been referred to a mental health team in the UK. The safeguarding review recommended statutory regulation of the guardianship sector, a multi-agency approach to vulnerable international children, and clear rules for residential summer programmes, but nothing has been enacted. InvestIN now keeps children's medication in a locked cabinet, and Aegis has tightened its criteria, but there is still no statutory regulation of guardians or residential summer schools.
Luna's funeral was held at Telford crematorium on 10 August, near the school where she had spent her only year in England. Wrekin planted an oak tree for her and held a memorial service. But her parents feel her death went painfully unseen. "She just disappeared," says Thomas, "and nobody in the UK noticed."
