Attendance, sickness and holidays

Children are expected to attend school for the full 190 days of the academic year, unless there is a good reason for absence. There are two types of absence:

• Authorised absence - where the school approves pupil absence
• Unauthorised absence - where the school does not approve absence

At Crossdale, we aim to achieve an attendance rate of over 95% (meaning children are absent from school no more than 1 day every 4 weeks). To support this we will provide the following in an effort to maintain and improve attendance:

• A caring and supportive atmosphere where children come first
• Careful registration, making sure mistakes are not made
• If a message has not been received, we will make a phone call or text home on the first morning of       children are absent from school
• Information for parents about attendance on a termly basis, at the end of each term
• Monitoring and support for children whose attendance is below 90%.

Any child with attendance below 90% is categorised as a persistent absentee, and are missing more than 1 day of school every 2 weeks on average. Children with attendance below 90% are highly unlikely to achieve their academic potential.  See more information about this in the document below. 

Please see the bottom of this page for our attendance policy which gives extensive detail about our approach to managing pupils' attendance. 

SICKNESS AND ABSENCE

In the event that your child is sick, we are advised that they should be kept away from other children for 48 hours.

If you are unsure about whether your child should attend school, please contact the school office by  telephoning - (0115) 974  8088 or by email - admin@crossdale.notts.sch.uk or visit the NHS website here: Is my child too ill for school? - NHS . Further guidance from the Public Health Agency is available here.

Document containing advice on when children should stay off school and nursery, and when they can return.

If a child is unable to attend school for any reason, such as illness or a doctor's appointment, it is vital to ring into school before 8.50am, giving the reason and when you expect the child to return to school. If we haven't heard from you by 10am, we will get in touch by text or by telephone.

Holidays During Term Time

When a pupil is withdrawn during term time there is disruption to the learning process and this can sometimes result in the pupil falling behind his/her peers.

School will only authorise leave of absence during term time where there are exceptional circumstances. 

School will not authorise holidays during term time.

Nottinghamshire County Council deem that the following are NOT legitimate reasons for taking your child out of school in term time:

• My work does not allow me to take holidays during the school holiday periods.
• The days overlap with the beginning or end of term.
• My child needs a holiday at quieter times due to their needs.
• Our holiday has been gifted or arranged by others, and we did not have a choice of dates.
• My child has good or 100% attendance.
• There is availability of cheaper holidays and travel arrangements.
• We booked the holiday before checking with the school.
• The holiday dates of siblings or family at other schools are different.
• We have day trips and birthday plans.
• It’s a special sporting fixture, show, or event that I want my child to attend.

If a child has been reported as unwell and a holiday is suspected, school will report to the local authority for a penalty notice fine. School is expected to carry out home visits.

School will look at child’s overall attendance figures, when considering referring to the Local Authority for issuing of a fixed penalty notice.

School will notify parents of penalty notice, should unauthorised leave of absence be taken (10 sessions over a 10-week rolling period. In this case, parents will receive a warning of penalty notice for unauthorised leave.

Requesting Pupil ABSENCE in TERM TIME

Where there are exceptional reasons, parents can complete the following form to request pupil absence during term time: https://forms.office.com/e/2sEmS5Q8KP

​​LATENESS

When your child arrives late at school, they miss important events like assembly, teacher instructions and introductions. Children also feel anxious and embarrassed at having to enter the classroom late.

Frequent lateness can add up to a considerable amount of learning being lost. This can seriously disadvantage your child and disrupt the learning of others. Please help your child to be punctual.

If a child is late 10 minutes each day it equates to 7 lost teaching days across the year.
20 minutes late each day equates 70 missed lessons across the year.

Please pop into school if you would like to discuss your child’s attendance.

 

While an attendance figure of 90% may not sound very low, research in 2016 showed it reduces a child's chance of achieving 5+ 5-9 grades at GCSE from 81% to around 57%. A child who averages 80% attendance during their secondary school career effectively misses one whole year of education and significantly reduces their chances of good grades.

Even for high-achieving students poor attendance has a significant negative impact on their grades. It has been shown that missing just 17 days of school in Year 11 reduces final GCSE grades by one level across all subjects. This could easily be sufficient to prevent a student getting on to the sixth-form course and ultimately the university or career of their choice.

We understand that sometimes children are genuinely ill and of course you must be the judge of this. However, there may be other factors which are causing reluctance to come to school and, if you believe this is the case, please contact us. We will do all we can to help.