Attendance

Attendance Responsibilities

Children are responsible for:

• Attending their lessons and any agreed activities when at school.
• Arriving punctually to lessons when at school.

Parents are responsible for:

• Providing accurate and up-to-date contact details.
• Providing the school with more than one emergency contact number.
• Updating the school if their details change.
• The attendance and punctuality of their children at school.
• Promoting good attendance and punctuality with their children.

Reporting Absences

Absence Procedures

Parents and carers are required to inform the school of their child’s absence as soon as possible on the first day of absence. This can be done by telephoning the school office or by completing the online Reporting Absence Form.

When a student returns to school following an absence, parents and carers must provide a signed written explanation confirming the reason for the absence. This is required even if the school has already been notified by telephone or through the online form.

Alternatively, parents and carers may report an absence in person by visiting the school office, where arrangements will be made for them to speak to a member of staff if required.

A telephone call will be made to the parent of any pupil who has not reported their child’s absence on the first day that they do not attend school. If we receive no response, we will classify the absence as unauthorised. If we do not hear from a child after 2 consecutive days all emergency contacts will be phoned. If we have not any contact about absence for four consecutive days, we will undertake a home visit. If a child is classed as vulnerable, we will contact all emergency contacts including social workers on first day of absence, if we have no response when calling. If we have any reason to have concerns surrounding a child’s absence, we may carry out a home visit.

The school will always follow up any absences in order to:

• Ascertain the reason for the absence.
• Ensure the proper safeguarding action is being taken.
• Identify whether the absence is authorised or not.
• Identify the correct code to use to enter the data onto the school census system.

In the case of PA, arrangements will be made for parents to speak to the attendance team.  

If a pupil’s attendance drops below 93 percent, the attendance officer will be informed, and a formal letter and meeting will be arranged with the pupil’s parent. Once a pupil’s attendance is below 93% they will need to provide medical evidence for any absence. The child’s class teacher will also receive a weekly attendance report card where they will share with the child and parent/carer at the end of the week their attendance.  If their attendance does not improve over a 6 week period a formal meeting will be set up for with the attendance AHT.

Where a pupil has not returned to school for 10 days after an authorised absence, or is absent from school without authorisation for 20 consecutive school days, the school will remove the pupil from the admissions register if the school and the LA have failed to establish the whereabouts of the pupil after making reasonable enquiries.

If a child feels sick in the middle of the school day, a member of SLT will make the decision about the child’s absence and whether they are sent home.

Lateness

The school will regard punctuality as of the utmost importance and lateness will not be tolerated.

The school day starts at 8.40 am. Children should be in their classroom at this time. Registers are taken as follows throughout the school day:

• Registers are marked by 8.50. Children will receive a late mark if they are not in their classroom by this time.
• The register closes at 9:10am. Children will receive a mark of absence if they do not attend school before this time.

Term-time leave

The school will require parents to observe the school holidays as prescribed; therefore, the headteacher will be unable to authorise holidays during term-time in most cases. The headteacher will be only allowed to grant a leave of absence in exceptional circumstances. Applications will be made in advance and the headteacher will be satisfied by the evidence which is presented, before authorising term-time leave. The headteacher will determine the amount of time a child can be away from school during term-time. Any leave of absence is at the discretion of the headteacher. Any requests for leave during term-time will be considered on an individual basis and the child’s previous attendance record will be taken into account.

Requests for leave will not be granted in the following circumstances:

• Immediately before and during assessment periods
• When a child’s attendance record shows any unauthorised absence
• Where a child’s authorised absence record is already above 10 percent for any reason

If parents take their child out of school during term-time without authorisation from the headteacher, they may be subject to sanctions such as penalty fines.

Religious observances

The school will take advice from local religious leaders of all faiths to establish the appropriate number of days of absence required for religious festivals. Parents will be required to inform the school in advance if absences are required for days of religious observance.

Appointments

As far as possible, parents will be encouraged to book medical and dental appointments outside of school hours. Where this is not possible, a note and appointment card will be sent to the school office.

If the appointment requires the child to leave during the school day, they will be signed out at the school office by a parent. Children will be expected to attend school before and after the appointment wherever possible.

Modelling, sport and acting performances/activities

The school will ensure that all children engaging in performances/activities (whether they, or another person, receives payment or not), which require them to be absent from school, understand that they will be required to obtain a licence from the LA which authorises the school’s absence(s).

Additional arrangements will be made by the school for children engaging in performances or activities that require them to be absent from school to ensure they do not fall behind in their education – this may involve private teaching. These arrangements will be approved by the LA who will ensure that the arrangements are suitable for the child.

The child will receive education that, when taken together over the term of the licence, amounts to a minimum of three hours per day that the child would be required to attend a school maintained by the LA issuing the licence. This requirement will be met by ensuring a child receives an education:

• For not less than six hours a week; and
• During each complete period of four weeks (or if there is a period of less than four weeks, then during that period), for periods of time not less than three hours a day; and
• On days where the child would be required to attend school if they were attending a school maintained by the LA; and
• For not more than five hours on any such day.

Where a licence has been granted by the LA and it specifies dates of absence, no further authorisation will be needed from the school. Where an application does not specify dates, and it has been approved by the LA, it is at the discretion of the headteacher to authorise the leave of absence for each day. The headteacher will not authorise any absences which would mean that a child’s attendance would fall below 97%. Where a licence has not been obtained, the headteacher will not authorise any absence for a performance or activity.

Young carers

The school understands the difficulties that face young carers, and will endeavour to identify young carers at the earliest opportunity, as well as through their time at the school. A caring and flexible approach will be taken to the needs of young carers and each child will be examined on a case-by-case basis, involving other agencies if appropriate.

The school, in conjunction with relevant authorities, will implement support for children who are young carers, to encourage their sustained and regular attendance at school in line with the school’s expectations.

Rewarding good attendance and punctuality

Good attendance and punctuality will be rewarded in the following ways

• Each week the attendance of each class is celebrated on the weekly newsletter.
• A weekly raffle also takes place for early years, KS1 and KS2 for the 100% attendees each week where they have chance to win a price for turning up to school every day.
• Each classroom will also have a clear attendance traffic light system to show parents, carers, and children the class’s attendance each week and to promote the understanding of national average being 96%.
• To promote attendance further, an attendance poster is sent home each week with the newsletter to ensure parents are aware of the expectations for attendance.

The school will develop strategies for ensuring that pupils with health needs or home circumstances that result in additional absences are not unfairly excluded from attendance rewards, e.g. by setting individualised targets.

Attendance Monitoring and review

Attendance and punctuality will be monitored throughout the year. The school’s attendance target is 97% – full details of the school’s absence levels can be found on the school website.

The Palmer Academy has adopted the following attendance and punctuality monitoring procedures, to ensure that children’ attendance and punctuality meets the expected standard, and effective intervention is provided where children’ attendance and/or punctuality falls below the standard:

1. A spreadsheet is sent by the Trust to the SLT and attendance officer detailing weekly and annual (cumulative) attendance and punctuality to date.
2. Attendance and punctuality is discussed by classroom teachers. Any attendance/punctuality trends noticed by classroom teachers are passed immediately to the SLT.
3. Contact is made with parents on the first day of absence for any child absence not reported. ‘N’ codes are used to indicate that the child is absent for a reason not yet provided; these N codes are reported to the SLT and attendance officer daily.
4. Contact is made to the parents of any children marked using the N code. Any N codes not established after a day are recorded as an unauthorised absence.

The attendance and Persistent Absence (P.A) of all children will be RAG’d (Purple, Green, Yellow, Amber, Red). 

Purple	Green	Yellow	Amber	Red
Attendance at or above 97% PA 8% or below	Attendance between 95.5 – 96.9% PA 8.1% - 10%	Attendance between 94 – 95.4% PA 10.1% -12%	Attendance between 92.5% - 93.9% PA 12.1% - 14%	Attendance 92.4% or below PA 15% or above