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Attendance
Regular attendance at school is absolutely necessary if a child is to achieve their potential. KES is relentless in driving good attendance and expects all students to be in school every day; attendance is monitored on a daily basis by the school's Attendance Officers.
Students are congratulated on achieving 95%+ in celebration assemblies each half term and given a certificate to commemorate their achievement.
KES would like all its students to aim for 100% attendance during each academic year; however, there will be occasions when a child is too unwell to come to school. All students are expected to achieve a minimum of 97% attendance over the course of the academic year. Students who fall below this will be monitored and those whose attendance is below 90% will fall into ‘intervention’, whereby parents may be called into school for a meeting to discuss concerns and ways to support and improve attendance. Students whose attendance falls below 90% will also be in the government’s Persistent Absence category which will require the school to seek the support of the Educational Welfare Service (EWS). Failure on a parent’s part to ensure their child attends school regularly, could result in legal intervention by EWS and possible legal action.
The school’s absence reporting procedure is as follows:
- Students arriving at any time after morning registration (7.55am) must report to student reception to sign in.
- Parents/carers must send a message via the School Gateway on the first day of absence before 8.10am, and on all subsequent days. This includes illness, medical appointments, college interviews, bereavements and funerals etc.
- When a student is absent from school and no message is received from home, the school will automatically call the parent via Truancy Call to ascertain the reason for the child’s absence.
- On returning to school, parents need to provide the student with a note of explanation to cover the period of absence – this is a legal requirement.
- To enable the school to authorise absences due to medical appointments (hospital, doctor, dentist, orthodontist or physiotherapist) parents/carers must provide evidence in the form of an appointment card or letter.
- If reasons for absence are not provided, a letter is posted home to parents/carers with a reply slip. If no reason is provided within seven days, absences become unauthorised.
Medical appointments
The school day allows for most medical appointments to be made after 2.30pm, thus avoiding the need to miss school. This is particularly so for doctor’s appointments and we do not expect such appointments to be made during the school day. Where hospital appointments occur during the school day, it is expected that the minimum time possible away from school will be taken. We do not expect children to miss an entire day’s school for a local appointment.
Arriving to school on time
Generally lateness is not acceptable and can be counted as unauthorised absence. Therefore, a student who arrives late must follow the school’s late procedure by signing in at the main reception and providing a written explanation for this lateness from their parent/carer. However, it is better for students to be late than not be in school at all.
Holidays in term time
In line with recent government regulation, parents cannot take their children out of school during term time for a holiday:
The school attendance regulations set out by the Department for Education were amended from the1 September 2013. The amendments made to the ‘Education (Pupil Registration) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2013 remove references to family holiday and extended leave as well as the statutory threshold of ten school days. The amendments make clear that headteachers may not grant any leave of absence during term time unless there are exceptional circumstances.
Any planned absences must be brought to the attention of the school well in advance, in writing, and given to Mrs Snares, Senior Attendance Officer. Any further clarification can be sought from Mrs Snares.
Important facts about attendance
Your child’s academic attainment may suffer if they miss school frequently. An example of how your child’s attendance can be affected is shown below:
- 20 days off per school year = 90% attendance
- 90% attendance = four whole weeks off school
- 90% attendance in Years 7-11 = half a year off school
- 90% attendance for your child throughout Primary and Secondary school = they will have missed a whole year of school in their education