Working together to improve school attendance
The DfE published new guidance which applies from 19 August 2024 ‘Working together to improve school attendance’
The guidance is for:
- all school and academy trust staff, headteachers, governors, academy trustees, and alternative provision providers
- local authority attendance staff, early help lead practitioners, social workers, and virtual school heads
- statutory safeguarding (including police and integrated care boards) and other local partners.
- This guidance may also be useful for parents and carers.
The guidance follows the School attendance consultation response – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) and includes the new expectations of schools and of local authority services.
Summary of changes are:
- Clarity of expectations: all Schools, trusts and local authorities will all have clearly defined statutory roles set out in a table of responsibilities
- Earlier intervention: all Schools will have legal responsibilities to proactively improve attendance for the first time (beyond existing requirements to record accurately) underpinned by timelier sharing of attendance data
- Support first: all pupils and parents, no matter where they live in the country, will have clear expectations from their school, be regularly informed about their child’s attendance and have access to early intervention and support first before any legal action if it becomes problematic
- Targeted whole family support: attendance teams in the local authority will work in tandem with early help to provide a whole-family response with a single assessment, plan, and lead practitioner
- Independent schools: data will be collected for the first time and will start to receive support from the local authority
What this means for schools
The School Attendance Improvement Team has been working to implement changes in the way that they support all schools in Devon, and schools are expected to start following the expectations, processes and guidelines as set out in ‘Working together to improve school attendance’ . This will start to roll out from September 2023.
The guidance should be read alongside existing statutory guidance documents on
- parental responsibility measures,
- children missing education,
- supporting pupils with medical conditions at school,
- suspensions and exclusions,
- alternative provision, and
- safeguarding.
The following 25 minute video has been put together for schools so that they can start to think the new DfE guidance and how they implement these expectations and changes within their settings.
Schools will find the DfE document Summary table of responsibilities for school attendance helpful in understanding their role in managing pupil attendance.
It is also suggested that schools review their current attendance practice. To support this and help move schools towards working within the guidance, the School attendance practice checklist has been put together. Schools might also find the document Securing good attendance and tackling persistent absence useful as an overview of pupil attendance management.
The DfE guidance also states that all schools need to have a clear school attendance policy on the school website, which all staff, pupils and parents understand. We have created a model attendance policy template for you to use and adapt to suit your setting. A good attendance policy is crucial for all schools. Your policy sets out your school expectations for pupil attendance. In addition, we are asking everyone to pledge their commitment to an ‘education attendance charter’ so that everyone is aware of their responsibility for improving attendance.