Attendance

Attendance and Absence

The law does not grant parents an automatic right to take their child out of school during term time. Any absence from school will disrupt your child’s learning. You may consider that a holiday will be educational, but your child will miss out on the teaching that their classmates will receive during your holiday. Attendance is vital to academic success and lost education poses a potential risk of underachievement.

This is something we all have a responsibility to avoid.

The Department for Education no longer allows Headteachers to grant any leave of absence during term time unless there are exceptional circumstances. If you consider that your request for absence is exceptional you will need to complete a Leave Request Form, available from the school office . A response will be sent to you as soon as possible. If leave is not authorised and you nevertheless withdraw your child from school, the absence will be recorded as unauthorised absence.

If your child is absent from school without authorisation, you will be committing an offence under the Education Act 1996. We may submit a request to Cornwall Council for a Penalty Notice to be issued, in accordance with Sections 444A and 444B of the said Act.

If a child is absent from school for any period, however short, the school should be notified as soon as possible on the first morning of the absence. If we do not hear we will try to contact parents/carers to find out why the child is not in school. If it is not a genuine reason or we do not hear back from parents, we must enter the child as having an unauthorised absence. Unauthorised absence is reported to the Education Welfare Officer so please notify as soon as possible. We have a 24-hour answerphone (01566 772198) which is constantly monitored during the school day, for you to leave us a message. Please advise us of medical appointments within school time so we can enter them in the register as a medical absence and not late attendance. These absences will also need to have a Leave Request form completed and may also need evidence to be provided e.g. appointment confirmation letter. Routine medical and dental appointments should be made outside of the school day or during the holidays where possible.

If a child is unwell, please do not send him or her to school. All children at school are expected to go outside at playtimes. A child who is unwell cannot be expected to work to their normal potential and staff are not available to mind sick children. Also, germs do spread quickly in schools and will cause issues through absence of children and/or staff.

We encourage children to arrive at 8.40am ready to commence lessons at 8:50 a.m. If a child is persistently late or absent, then the Education Welfare Officer may become involved.

If your child is unwell with sickness or diarrhoea, they must be absent from school for 48 hours after the last bout of illness. If they have a temperature, they must be absent for 24 hours once the temperature has passed and free of medication in this time. We do not allow the use of Calpol or Ibuprofen in school for general illness unless it is for pain relief of a known injury e.g. a broken arm.

ADMAT Attendance Policy 11-2024 [Review 05-2027]

Why is good attendance in school important?

Please take the time to read our 'Good Attendance' leaflet. Paper copies are available in the school office.

In light of the significant amount of school absences in recent years, the Department for Education have put out new guidelines and statutory expectations for school attendance that we as schools must follow.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/securing-good-attendance-and-tackling-persistent-absence/securing-good-attendance-and-tackling-persistent-absence

Attendance is crucial in securing good learning outcomes for your child. We will only authorise absences for medical reasons/appointments or family events listed in the exceptional circumstances - for example, an immediate family wedding/funeral. We cannot authorise any other holiday, eg., for birthdays, family visits, get-togethers.

Any absence must be formally requested via the form available from the school office.

Thank you for your support in this matter of vital importance.

SC Good_School_Attendance_Leaflet