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Attendance

Improving attendance is everyone’s business. The barriers to accessing education are wide and complex, both within and beyond the school gates, and are often specific to individual pupils and families.

The Department for Education have published guidance which will be applicable from 19th August, 2024 to all schools, LA’s and parents.

Regular and punctual attendance at school is both a legal requirement and essential for pupils to maximise their educational opportunities.

In recognition of this, the law makes it an offence for a parent or carer to fail to secure the regular attendance of their child at a school at which the child is a registered pupil, without good reason or the agreement of the school.

The definition of a parent is defined in section 576 of the Education Act (1996) as:

the biological parents of a child, whether they are married or not
any person who has parental responsibility for a child
any person who has the care of a child i.e. lives with and looks after the child

If you are worried about your child’s attendance you should speak to your child’s school as soon as possible.

Every school will have a clear policy on school attendance including the procedure of how lateness is dealt with, sickness is recorded and supporting children who struggle to attend school regularly or who may experience difficulties when they are in school.

Requesting a leave of absence in term time

Schools can only agree a leave of absence for exceptional circumstances and all requests must be made in advance by a parent who the pupil normally lives with. Schools are then expected to consider each application individually, taking into account the specific facts and circumstances and relevant background context behind the request.

If a leave of absence is granted, it is for the school to determine the length of the time the pupil can be away from school. Generally, the DfE does not consider a need or desire for a holiday or other absence for the purpose of leisure and recreation to be an exceptional circumstance. Therefore, any leave taken for the purpose of a holiday is unlikely to be regarded as an exceptional circumstance.

If a parent does not request the leave and it is suspected that the child has been taken on holiday, the parent will be informed in a letter from the school and will be requested to provide evidence to support the reason for the leave of absence.

Code of Conduct for issuing Penalty Notices

Penalty notices are one of the sanctions available for this offence and offer a means of swift intervention, which can be used to combat attendance problems before they become entrenched.

For further guidance on the issuing of penalty notices for unauthorised leave, the national threshold and the process of issuing penalty notices for unauthorised patterns of absence please see the full Code of Conduct:

Penalty Notice Code of Conduct July 24 FINAL