Attendance
Please telephone the school before 9.30am if your child is absent.
Forms are available from the school office for planned absences.
If your child has to leave school during the day a parent or carer must sign the signing out book.
Please call at the school office to complete the process: it is important that the office staff know if your child is on or off the premises. If a child returns to school during the day, they must be signed in.
Children’s education can easily be seriously disrupted and parents should consider very carefully before taking their child out of school for a holiday.
The headteacher is not permitted to authorise holidays taken in term time. The school has adopted the Local Authority’s published policy. In accordance with the policy, parents may be fined by the Local Authority if there is persistent absence or time is taken for holidays during term time. Please contact the school office for more information.
Absences which are excessive or cannot be adequately explained will be reported to the Education Welfare Service, who will take appropriate action, since attendance at school is a legal obligation.
Holidays in term time
You are required under the Education Act (1996) to ensure your child attends school regularly. If your child accrues 10 consecutive sessions of unauthorised absence you may be liable for a penalty notice (one days absence equals two sessions and a five day absence is equal to 10 sessions).
An unauthorised absence is any absence that the Head teacher has not given permission for or where an explanation has not been provided by the parents.
Parents must complete a request for absence from school in exceptional circumstances form and submit this to the school, allowing for sufficient time to enable the school to consider the request and inform parents of the decision.
Where parents do not follow the school’s procedures of submitting a request and simply remove their child without seeking prior approval, a warning may not be given and you may be liable for a penalty notice.
If your request is declined or you do not follow the correct procedure and you still take your child out of school each parent within your household may be issued with a £60 penalty notice for each child you have taken out of school. If a penalty notice remains unpaid after 21 days it will increase to £120. If after 28 days it remains unpaid you may be summonsed to appear before Magistrates to explain why your child has unauthorised school absences and you may be liable for a fine of up to £1000.
Copies of the absence from school for exceptional circumstances request form with the information for parents, the revised referral form and the revised code of conduct are available to download below.
Further information, circulated by the local authority, can be found in the policy below:
‘Student Responsibility and Community Engagement: Year 6 pupils are given responsibilities, such as being ‘dinner buddies’ and leading celebration assemblies.’
‘Wider Development Opportunities: The school promotes pupils’ wider development through opportunities beyond the curriculum, such as links with a school in Uganda, debates, sustainability awareness, and diverse role models.’
‘Governance and Safeguarding: Governors have a strong understanding of the school’s strengths and areas for improvement, effectively supporting and challenging the school leadership.’
‘Enthusiastic Curriculum Leaders: Pupils, including those with special needs, benefit from scaffolded tasks and appropriately pitched work.’
‘Student Responsibility and Community Engagement: The school offers numerous lunchtime and after-school clubs, fostering interests in sports and creative arts.’
‘Enthusiastic Curriculum Leaders: Curriculum leaders have clear visions for their subjects, with PE and mathematics leaders investing in schemes to support teachers.’
‘Well-Planned Curriculum: The school has redesigned its curriculum to build on existing knowledge, with all teachers responsible for specific areas.’
‘Support for Early Career Teachers: The school supports early career teachers with training from subject leaders.’
‘Effective Phonics Teaching: The school is considering a new phonics program to maintain high-quality teaching.’
‘Governance and Safeguarding: Safeguarding arrangements are effective, with consistent training and comprehensive incident logging.’
‘Student Responsibility and Community Engagement: Pupils also engage in community activities, like making Christmas food hampers and starting a road safety campaign.’
‘Support for Early Career Teachers: An emotional literacy support assistant has been employed to enhance the special educational needs and disabilities team, providing valuable support to parents and pupils.’
‘Effective Phonics Teaching: Reading books match the taught sounds, and additional support is provided for pupils needing extra help.’
‘Happy and Safe Environment: Pupils feel happy and safe at school, working cooperatively and responding well to teachers’ instructions. They perceive the behavior policy as fair and report that bullying is rare.’
‘Effective Phonics Teaching: The phonics leader ensures consistent teaching of phonics across the school.’
‘Well-Planned Curriculum: Curriculum leaders have developed knowledge organisers to identify key knowledge, skills, and vocabulary, which are shared with families and pupils.’
