Aims and Objectives 

The attendance policy ensures that all staff, governors and parents in our schools are fully aware of and clear about the actions necessary to promote good attendance. 

We are committed to:

• Promoting and modelling high attendance and its benefits.
• Ensuring equality and fairness for all.
• Ensuring this attendance policy is clear and easily understood by staff, pupils and parents.
• Intervening early and working with other agencies to ensure the health and safety of our pupils.
• Building strong relationships with families to overcome barriers to attendance.
• Working collaboratively with other schools in the area, as well as other agencies.
• Ensuring parents follow the framework set in section 7 of the Education Act 1996, which states that the parent of every child of compulsory school age shall cause them to receive efficient full-time education suitable to their age, ability and aptitude, and to any SEND they may have, either by regular attendance at school or otherwise.

• Regularly monitoring and analysing attendance and absence data to identify pupils or cohorts that require more support.
• Creating an ethos in which good attendance and punctuality are recognised as the norm and seen to be valued by our schools
• Raising awareness of parents, carers, and pupils of the importance of uninterrupted attendance and punctuality at every stage of a child’s education.
• Ensuring that our policy applies to non-statutory school age children in order to promote good habits at an early age.
• Establishing a pattern of monitoring attendance and ensuring consistency in recognising achievement and dealing with difficulties.
• Recognising the key role of all staff in promoting good attendance.

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Addressing Attendance Concerns   

The school expects attendance of at least 95%.

It is important for children to establish good attendance habits early on in their school career. It is the responsibility of the Headteacher and the governors to support good attendance and to identify and address attendance concerns promptly. We rely upon parents to ensure their child attends school regularly and punctually and therefore where there are concerns regarding attendance parents are always informed of our concerns.

The ACE Derbyshire attendance procedure is as follows:

1. Daily monitoring of attendance by office staff
2. A letter or conversation to alert parents that attendance is below 90%. T
3. The child’s attendance will be monitored over the next 20 days. If the child’s attendance does not improve, parents will be invited to an attendance meeting to ascertain the reasons for the absences. If appropriate, an attendance plan will be written outlining the responsibilities and views of the child, parent and the school. Parents will also be informed of their legal responsibility regarding attendance. The attendance plan will be reviewed in 20 days.

If a child’s attendance does not improve and absences are unauthorised this may lead to consideration of parental responsibility measures which include the issue of penalty notice fines or other statutory action. 

Parents can contact Jayne Walters and Ali Blake for support with attendance in our school.

Applications for Leave of Absence in Term Time

In September 2013 the government introduced new regulations making it clear that Headteachers must not give approval for any leave of absence during term time, including holidays, unless there are exceptional circumstances.

Parents/carers are expected to take their children on holiday during the school holidays to minimise the impact of missing education. Parents/carers should be aware that it is the policy of the schools in this Trust not to approve term time holidays unless in exceptional circumstances.

Any requests for term time leave should be made on a holiday request form available from the school office and handed in at least 2 school weeks before the first date of the requested absence whenever possible. You must have received written authorisation before your child can be absent from school.

Parent/carers may be issued with a penalty notice fine or prosecution should leave of 5 days or more be taken which is not authorised by the Headteacher, or where repeated incidents of leave in term time for less than 5 days occur or where the unauthorised absence contributes to wider poor attendance that meets the legal threshold. (Attendance code G). 

Headteachers may seek advice from colleagues within the Trust for requests from parents to ensure a consistent approach.

National framework for penalty notices

The new national threshold for consideration of legal action is 10 sessions of unauthorised absence in a rolling period of 10 school weeks. A school week means any week in which there is at least one school session. This can be met with any combination of unauthorised absence, including lates after close of register (Attendance code U) and unauthorised leave in term time (Attendance code G).

If your child’s absence falls into this category the school will decide if further offers of support is likely to improve the situation or if a request for legal action should be submitted to the Local Authority.

Penalty notices for unauthorised absences will be charged at £160, reduced to £80 if paid within 21 days.

A penalty notice of £120 may also be issued where parents allow their child to be present in a public place during school hours without reasonable justification during the first five days of a fixed period or permanent exclusion. This will be reduced to £60 if paid within 21 days.

Parents will only get up to two fines for the same child in a three-year period. Once this limit has been reached, other action such as a parenting order or prosecution will be considered.

Where attendance still does not improve following a fixed penalty notice, the school will work with the LA to take forward attendance prosecution as a last resort.

Parents who are prosecuted and attend court because their child has not been attending school may be fined up to £2,500.