Attendance
As a parent or carer of a child aged between 5 and 16 years, you are legally responsible for ensuring your child accesses a full-time education that meets their needs.
If children do not attend school regularly, they may not be able to keep up with school work. It's not only the academic work that suffers; missing out on the social side of school life can affect your child's ability to make and keep friends - a vital part of growing up.
Studies have shown that children who achieve at least 96% school attendance or above have the best outcome from their education.
Please see the following guidance for more information:
https://www.gov.uk/school-attendance-absence
The school works with Everyday Counts to monitor and maintain our school attendance.
Attendance Monitoring Procedures
As a school, we are legally required to monitor your child’s attendance and punctuality. Our school is also supported in monitoring and managing attendance by Everyday Counts. Everyday Counts works to support schools, parents/carers, and pupils to achieve regular school attendance to help them reach their full attainment potential.
The process we follow when monitoring attendance is as follows:
We always aim to offer support and guidance to families struggling to improve attendance and as well as support in school, we can offer referrals for support from external agencies where required.
Punctuality
Being on time is also vital to your child's education. Arriving late is disruptive for your child, their teacher and other children in the class. The morning register is taken at 8.35am; children are marked as late if they arrive in class after the register has been taken. Registers close at 8:45am after this time children will then be marked as late (L code). U codes (unauthorised late) are used for children arriving after 9am.
If your child comes through the front office after this time, you must sign them in, and your child will have a late mark.
The school day finishes at 3.05pm. Parents should be at school to collect their child/ren at these times. Parents who are not here when pupils are dismissed are late.
A record of late arrivals and pick-ups will be kept by office staff. A member of SLT will monitor the information provided letters will be sent home accordingly.
Pupil Absence
If your child is ill and is unable to attend school, you can report this via the Studybugs app before 8:30am.
You can also contact the school office via phone.
Phone: 01322 223382
Is my child too ill for school? - NHS (www.nhs.uk)
How to improve your child’s attendance
You can support your child’s regular attendance by ensuring:
- A clear bedtime routine is established, with alarms set in good time.
- Bags, lunch boxes and PE kits are organised and packed the night before they are needed, and homework is completed.
- Medical and dental appointments are organised outside of school hours wherever possible.
We would like to thank our parents for their continued support ensuring their children are attending school regularly and on time.
Absence During Term Time
The ability of the Head Teacher and Trustees to grant leave during term time was removed by the Education (Pupil Registration) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2013. These regulations came into effect on 1st September 2013 and specify that Head Teachers may not grant any leave of absence during term time unless there are exceptional circumstances.
The Department of Education issued all schools the following guidance called 'Working together to improve school attendance' which came into effect from 19th August 2024, parents may receive a penalty notice if their child has 10 or more sessions (5 days) of unauthorised absence within a 10-week period. This is a significant shift, as it places an increased emphasis on consistent attendance and the need for parental awareness regarding the implications of unauthorised absences.
Furthermore, it is vital to note that penalty notice fines for schools are outlines a tiered approach to offences, categorising them into clear stages:
- First offence: The first time a Penalty Notice is issued for term time leave or irregular attendance the amount will be: £160 per parent per child if paid within 28 days, this is reduced to £80 per parent, per child if paid within 21 days
- Second offence: The second time a Penalty Notice is issued for term time leave or irregular attendance the amount will be: £160 per parent, per child to be paid within 28 days, no reduced rate will be offered
- Third offence: The third time an offence is committed for term time leave or irregular attendance a Penalty Notice will not be issued, and the case will be presented straight to the Magistrates Court, Magistrates fines can be up to £2,500 per parent, per child. Cases found guilty in Magistrates Court can show on a parents future DBS certificate, due to failure to safeguard a child’s education.
If parents do take their child on holiday during term time, without the authority of the school then they can face the possibility of a fine. We fully appreciate that holidays are far cheaper in term time, but taking children out of school has a dramatic impact on the learning opportunities available to the children.
If you feel you need to remove your child from school due to exceptional circumstances, please submit any requests to the school office.
