Attendance

We strongly believe that there is a direct link between children's progress and a child’s level of attendance. We take seriously our responsibility of monitoring and addressing attendance issues and acknowledge that irregular attendance seriously disrupts the continuity of learning for children. It is essential that home and school work together to ensure all pupils at Whitehouse Community Primary School get the best start in life.

Our Responsibility as a School

Whitehouse Community Primary School is responsible for ensuring that children have good attendance by:

·  Providing a curriculum that is engaging and meets the needs of all learners.

·  Ensuring that attendance registers are kept accurately, using all necessary register codes.

·  Differentiating appropriately between authorised and unauthorised absence.

·  Contacting parents when there is concern about a child’s absence either by phone or letter.

·  Phoning parents on the first day of absence if a reason for absence has not been received.

·  Consulting with Education Welfare with concerns around children’s attendance or CME.

·  Making a referral to the EWO service where necessary, adopting the Penalty Notice Protocol.

·  Acknowledging good attendance of pupils or classes (e.g. assemblies, certificates or prizes).

· Giving children's attendance updates through our website, parent interviews and through newsletters.

·  Issuing Children's Registration Certificates regularly and include them in annual reports.

·  Continuing to undertake regular attendance audits.

Parents Responsibilities

The Education Act 1996 states that all children should attend school regularly and punctually. The Act states, “If a child of compulsory school age who is registered at a school fails to attend regularly at the school, his/her parent is guilty of an offence”.

We ask parents to work with us to ensure good attendance by:

• Ensuring your child arrives on time every day.
• Notifying school on the first day of absence by phone.
• On returning to school, provide an explanation for absence.
• Providing medical information if requested.
• Wherever possible make medical/dental appointments outside of school hours.
• Not taking holidays in term time.

Did you know…? 

90% attendance means that your child misses on average:

• One half day every week
• Nearly four weeks every school year
• Over one school year in a school career

If you take your child on holiday from school for two 2 weeks during term they can only ever achieve 95% attendance and they will miss about two terms in a school career

Also being 5 minutes late every day means missing about 3 days of school every year!

Please find our current attendance for each class: