Attendance and Punctuality

We recognise that a high level of school attendance is essential for a child to reach their full educational achievement. We are committed to providing an education of the highest quality for all our children and we endeavour to provide an environment in which all students feel valued, safe and welcome. Every child has a right to access the education to which they are entitled. Parents and teachers share the responsibility for supporting and promoting
excellent school attendance and punctuality for all.

Aims

We aim to achieve a goal of 100% attendance for all children. Every opportunity will be used to convey to children and their parents or carers the importance of regular and punctual attendance.

For our students to take full advantage of the educational opportunities offered it is vital that parents ensure that their child is at school, on time, every day the school is open, unless the reason for the absence is unavoidable. Statistics show a direct link between underachievement and absence below 95%

Our procedures

In order to meet our aims we will:

• Develop a strong partnership between the school, parents and the child.
• provide information on all matters related to attendance
• report to you on how your child is performing in school, what their attendance and punctuality rate is and how this relates to their attainment
• celebrate good attendance

Students will:

• attend every day unless they are too ill to do so
• arrive in school on time if they are independent travellers

Parents/carers

Ensuring your child’s regular attendance at school is a parent/carer’s legal responsibility (section 444 of the 1996 Education Act) and permitting absence from school that is not authorised by the school creates an offence in law. A child not attending school is considered a safeguarding matter. This is why information about the cause of any absence is always required. If your child is absent you must contact us as soon as possible on the first day of absence.

We request that all parents/carers:

• inform the school on the first day of absence via a phone call to the main office on 020 8269 6523 or by emailing absence@cleevemeadow-tkat.org. This must be in addition to contacting the transport service as information does not always get relayed.
• discuss with the class teacher any unavoidable planned absences well in advance
• support the school with their child in aiming for 100% attendance each year
• make sure that any absence is clearly accounted for by telephone or email on the first and subsequent days of absence, or by letter if a phone is unavailable
• avoid taking their child out of school for non-urgent medical or dental appointments
• only request leave of absence if it is for an exceptional circumstance.