Brooklands
Primary School
Schools receive very clear guidance from the DfE (Department for Education) regarding their legal duty to ensure the children in their care receive their legal entitlement to school attendance. We are led by this guidance and follow it closely. This can be summarised as follows:
School’s attendance team hold monthly meetings where we focus on pupils whose attendance is below 95% (the DfE class 90% and below as a persistent absentee). Once a child’s attendance falls below 95%, they enter the school’s staged attendance system.
| Stage 1 | Letter to parent informing them of their child’s attendance and offering support for this to be improved. |
| Stage 2 | Should the attendance fail to improve, parents are invited to meet with the Headteacher/Deputy Headteacher to discuss how the attendance can improve. Any further absences without medical note to be marked as unauthorised. |
| Stage 3 | Should the attendance fail to improve following Stage 2, a referral to the local authority will be made. This may result in a fine and/or court summons. |
| Term-time holidays | Term-time holidays will always be marked as unauthorised. If they exceed 4 days across the year, this will result in a referral and may result in a fine of £60 per child, per parent. |
We reassure parents who do not take term-time holidays that the above process is implemented fully, albeit confidentially.
Reporting absence
This should be done via our Brooklands Primary School app where you can see a live record of your child’s absence.
Punctuality
Children deserve to attend school on time each day to ensure they maximise their learning potential. Arriving late is not only embarrassing to the child but also causes them to miss a key element of learning each day, e.g. reading. As a result, we have a similar staged system in place regarding punctuality.
For further information, please see our Attendance Policy.
The links below are leaflets from the Local Authority regarding attendance: