Attendance

At Wrenbury, we are committed to the continuous raising of achievement of all our pupils. Regular attendance is critical if our pupils are to be successful and benefit from the opportunities presented to them. Good attendance is fundamental to a successful and fulfilling school experience.

In partnership with parents we have a duty to promote good attendance.
Parental Responsibility
Parents have a legal duty to ensure that their children attend school regularly and arrive on time. Regular attendance is essential to the all-round development of the child and they should be allowed to take full advantage of educational opportunities available to them in order to make good progress in their learning.

Why is attendance important?
Attending school on a regular basis is the key to your child doing well at school and sets them up with good habits from an early age through to adulthood and the working world.

It also gives children the opportunity to:

• make friends and feel included
• boost social skills, confidence and self-esteem
• develop the skills to learn new things
• achieve their full potential
• improve their prospects

Small changes can make a big difference

Parents are advised to:

• Show your child that you think school is important
• Not keep your child off school if they are worried or have a problem – you should come and talk to the school
• Praise you child's achievements
• Recognise that if your child gets into bad habits from an early age, these are hard to break later in life

How good is your child's attendance?
All pupils are expected to attend regularly to be able to access and achieve their full potential at school. It is accepted that some of our pupils have medical conditions which may impact on their attendance; it is important that school understand how we can support children with medical needs and ask that you discuss your child's individual needs with Mrs Cador or our SENDco Mrs Charlesworth.

90% attendance might sound good, but...
90% attendance is the same as:

• ½ day missed each week
• 20 days in each school year
• A full month out of school

So, 90% is not as good as it first seems.

Days off school add up to lost learning
There are 175 non-school days a year; 175 days to spend on family time, visits, holidays, shopping, household jobs and other appointments.

190 days in school days in each year
190 days for your child's education

Being late also adds up to a loss of learning
If your child is:

• 5 minutes late every day that adds up to over 3 days lost over each year.
• 10 minutes late every day adds up to over 6 lost days each year
• 15 minutes late is the same as being absent 2 weeks each year.

Late arrival to school
When your child arrives late at school, they miss the teacher's instructions and the introduction to the lesson. Your child may also feel embarrassed at having to enter the classroom late. In EYFS and KS1 children may also miss their daily phonics session which can impact very negatively on their Reading development.
Please help your child to be punctual.

What can I do to increase my child's attendance?

• Only keep your child at home for genuine illness.
• Book appointments after school or during the holidays.
• Attend school before or after appointments, do not take the whole day off.
• Avoid taking holidays in school time.

Parents and carers have a responsibility to make sure that their children attend school regularly, on time and receive a full-time education. It is the law.

A child registered at school can legally only miss schools in very limited circumstances. These are:
-When your child is really too unwell to attend
-When the school have authorised the absence beforehand.
-If your child is missing without good reason, schools and local authorities have a number of legal powers that they can use.

Authorised Absences include:

• Genuine illness resulting with seeing a doctor
• Religious observance
• Family bereavement

Unauthorised absences include

• Holidays and family outings
• Traffic
• Unable to get child to school
• Birthday celebrations
• Oversleeping
• Parent appointments or ill health
• Sibling appointments or ill health
• Waiting for a delivery
• Waiting for a builder, plumber, electrician
• No uniform or uniform not ready
• Shopping

In cases of illness, parents are asked to telephone the school on 01270 260656 and speak to a member of the office team or email admin@wrenbury.cheshire.sch.uk. Please remember to give specific details of the illness because "poorly/unwell" is not sufficient. If school have not been notified of your child's absence we operate a 'first day calling' system whereby we make contact with parents to ascertain the reason for absence – if we are not successful in identifying a reason for a child's absence we may make a home visit.

If the absence continues please keep the school updated. A note confirming the reason for absence should be sent in with your child upon their return to school.

Requesting Absence from School
Any request for absence must be made in writing with an explanation of why the absence is being requested, the start and end dates and the reason for the absence. From 1 September 2013, headteachers have been unable to agree leave of absence during term time unless they are satisfied there are exceptional circumstances. Authorised absence cannot be given retrospectively. Please give sufficient time for your request to be considered or the absence will be unauthorised.

If you require any advice, support or guidance, please contact the School Office.

Illness

All children may at some point feel 'under the weather' or suffer from a cough or a cold or a minor ailment. It is ok to send children to school feeling under the weather or with a cough and/or cold or a minor, non-contagious ailment. These should not be determiners for school absence. When a cough or cold is a symptom along with a high temperature, then it is acceptable for the child to be at home.
If a child is sent to school feeling under the weather, staff in school will monitor the child closely and if they deteriorate or school is not deemed the best place for the child, then a phone call home will be made to collect the child so that they are in a more comfortable setting. A 'Request to give medication' form should be completed with the office admin should your child need any form of medication eg antibiotics during the school day as part of a course of prescribed medication.

Parents are asked to keep a child off for a full 48 hours following the last 'case' where s/he suffers sickness or diarrhoea. Parents are asked to contact the school for advice regarding recommended absence for contagious illness.

The school works closely with the Doctor's Surgery in Wrenbury to promote ways to look after minor ailments. The school has been awarded the NHS Bronze Award for Self-Care (July 2018) and we've achieved the NHS Silver Self Care Award for our work on promoting 'Immunisation' leading to the Community Award being presented to school at the School Business Awards in November 2020.