Attendance and Punctuality
It is vital that children are in school and on time. Please phone the office and speak to Mrs Clowes if for any reason your child cannot attend school or is going to be late.
Our attendance target is to ensure that we achieve greater than 96% attendance (on average) for all children.
If your child is absent just 5% of the time, this means they are missing a day every month, which would certainly cause problems for an adult in work and makes it difficult for children to keep up with their classmates.
If your child is absent 10% of the time, this equals a day off every fortnight.
Attendance below 80% means they are having a day off every week.
If your child is late, they will have missed vital opportunities to respond to teachers’ feedback. It can also be embarrassing for a child to consistently start the day late and cause them to be unhappy. If parents are struggling to get children in to school regularly and on time for whatever reason, please get in touch. We are here to help.
Children who achieve better than 98% attendance as well as those achieving over 90% who have made a concerted effort to make a greater than 10% improvement in their attendance will get a special certificate at the end of each term.
We can only ensure children make good progress if they are in school. Please do everything you can to support your child’s learning by getting them into school on time every day.
When children miss school for term time holidays not only do they miss out on important learning but they often take time to settle back into their learning routines.
The government is strengthening the rules around Education Penalty Notices. These are fixed penalty fines which can be issued by the Local Authority where 10 or more sessions (5 days) of unauthorised absence take place.
They are most commonly issued to parents when a child misses school for a term time holiday taken without the permission of the school.
The new stronger rules will apply to all offences taking place after August 2024.
- For the first fine issued after the start of the 24-25 school year, the fine will increase to £80 per parent per child if paid within 21 days, or £160 if paid within 28 days.
- If a second fine is then issued to the same parent for the same child within three years of the first fine it will be for £160.
- Subsequent offences - no further fines can then be issued if two have already been issued to the same parent for the same child within the previous three years (starting with the date of the first fine); instead the parent will be prosecuted by the Local Authority in the Magistrates’ Court.
It’s therefore more important than ever that parents arrange to take family holidays in the school holidays and not in term time.