Attendance

School Attendance Information

It is essential that we return to our high expectations of attendance. All pupils are expected to attend every day, unless they are too unwell to do so. Absence is not authorised for holidays, days out or sibling/family illness. There are still some restrictions to attendance regarding COVID seen below, however we expect pupil attendance to be above 95% unless in extenuating circumstances.

As you are aware, we constantly monitor our pupil’s attendance and work with parents to ensure that pupils receive the education and life choices they deserve. Good attendance in school is a key objective to improving attainment. If a child is absent from school they miss out on key aspects of a sequence of lessons, alongside key building blocks within a curriculum topic and other keys aspects of learning.

Why worry about attendance?

• A 90% attendance rate means a pupil is missing one half day of lessons every week.  If that pupil has a 90% attendance rate through KS1 and KS2 they will have missed one half of a school year in that time!
• A pupil with an 80% attendance rate over 5 years misses one complete year of school.  In attendance terms that would mean the pupil has missed 40 days of education in a school year, just over 1 day per week.  Therefore if pupil’s attendance remains at 80% from year 1 to year 11 they will miss more than 2 full years of education!

Good school attendance contributes to all outcomes for every child. Parents should perform their legal duty by ensuring their children attend regularly and are punctual to their lessons.  Time away from school also has a huge impact on young children socially as they may find it difficult to form strong relationships with their peers if they are often absent. It is also very difficult for them to catch up on missed work which continues while they are away.

Obviously if your child has an illness they need to be kept home but please could we ask that you adhere to the following guidelines:

• Please notify us by 8.45am of your child’s absence on the first day and tell us what the specific illness is i.e. sore throat, sickness bug – not just unwell.
• Continue to contact the school each day of absence. Work will not be set for children, as if they are well enough to work at home, they are likely to be well enough to attend school. However, in extenuating circumstances, pupils are encouraged to access the online learning platforms such as times table rock stars.
• Only keep your child home for as long as the illness lasts – even if this means returning to school on a Friday – this is still a school day and is a whole day of learning that your child will miss!
• Please do not keep children at home for any other reason, e.g. sibling/parent illness, birthday, day out.

We strive to work with parents to improve attendance and we will write to you to make you aware of any concerns we have if a child's attendance falls below 95% over a five week period. This monitoring will then continue until attendance/punctuality improves to a satisfactory standard.

We would ask for your on-going co-operation and if you have any concerns please do not hesitate to contact the school for support.

COVID19

The current government guidance is below:

Try to stay at home and avoid contact with other people

If you have symptoms of a respiratory infection, such as COVID-19, and you have a high temperature or do not feel well enough to go to work or carry out normal activities, try to stay at home and avoid contact with other people, until you no longer have a high temperature (if you had one) or until you no longer feel unwell.

Therefore if your child has any of the below symptoms and is feeling unwell, if they have a high temperature (and not other symptoms) or has had a positive COVID test outcome they should remain at home until they no longer feel unwell. Children should not attend school if they have a high temperature.

The main symptoms of coronavirus are:

* A high temperature - this means you feel hot to touch on your chest or back;

* A new, continuous cough - this means coughing a lot for more than an hour, or 3 or more coughing episodes in 24 hours;

* A loss or change to your sense of taste or smell - this means you've noticed that you cannot taste or smell anything, or tastes or smells are different to normal.

Although other common symptoms such as sore throat, headache and heavy cold are also highly prevalent in positive cases in children.

It is essential that all of our families follow the current guidance surrounding COVID19.