Attendance

For students to reach their full potential they need to be in school. Full attendance means a student can benefit from and enjoy everything the school has to offer. We want to work with parents to ensure school attendance is consistently excellent.

All parents who have children of compulsory school age have a legal responsibility to ensure that they receive an effective education. Parents whose children are registered at school are therefore responsible for ensuring that they attend regularly, punctually and stay in school during school hours. Failure to do so is an offence under Section 444 of the Education Act 1996.

Millthorpe’s attendance policy

We reserve the right to use the fixed penalty notice once all other interventions have been explored with both students and parents. This decision is not made lightly but does reflect the importance we place on attendance.

We feel that by working together with parents we can remove many barriers that might lead to poor attendance. Your child’s Form Tutor is their first port of call when trying to stop any worrying attendance patterns. They will be reviewing attendance data on a weekly basis, they may feel that contact is required to see if any negative trend can be halted and reversed.

Any student with an attendance percentage below 95% (without medical evidence to explain absence) will have further absence classified as ‘unauthorised’.

What to do when your child is absent

If your child is likely to be absent from school, on the day of absence and BEFORE 8.30am, please either:

• Call: 01904 686400 and select option 1 to speak with our attendance officer or leave a message
• Email: attendance@millthorpe.elt.org.uk

Please make sure you give your child’s name, form and the reason for absence.

Please do this for each day of absence.

The Attendance Officer may then be in touch, depending on the nature of the absence and current attendance levels.

The school tracks unauthorised absences for all students. If your child is marked absent with no reason at morning registration, you will be contacted by the school so we can ascertain the reason for the absence or to alert you if your child is not in school when he or she should be.

If your child has medical issues

We recognise that some students have medical issues that lead to lower / poor attendance. This is obviously outside of the student’s control. In this case, please provide up to date evidence of their condition (doctors’ notes, appointment cards, appropriate medical records). The school will do their best to support any child in this position.

Absence requests

According to the Department for Education guidelines, headteachers can only authorise leave of absence in exceptional circumstances. It is important to understand that parents and carers do not have an automatic right for their children to have time off for holidays in term time. If you wish to apply, please complete a Leave of Absence Request form at least two weeks before and hand it in to the school office.

Registration times

The DfE stipulate that attendance for morning and afternoon sessions must be recorded in a particular way. In accordance with this:

Our official school day starts at 8.40am
Students arriving late, but within 30 minutes of this time (i.e. by 9.09am) will receive a late mark (L).
Students arriving 30 or minutes after this time (from 9.10am onwards) will receive a U code. If your child arrives at 9.10am or later, under DfE stipulations, they will be recorded as having an unauthorised absence for the whole morning session, even if they are present for most of their morning lessons. Morning punctuality is therefore crucial.

Our official afternoon session starts at 13.45pm.
Students coming to school in the afternoon, but within 30 minutes of this time (arriving by 14.14) will receive a late mark (L) for the afternoon session.

Children arriving 30 or minutes after this time (from 14.15 – 14.45) will receive a U code. If your child arrives at 14.15 or later for the afternoon session, under DfE stipulations, they will be recorded as having an unauthorised absence for the whole afternoon session, even if they are present for the remainder of their Period 5 lesson. Afternoon punctuality and ensuring that your child is in school at 13.45 is therefore also crucial. Please bear this in mind if booking medical appointments etc as they need to still be in school at 13.45 to receive an afternoon present mark.

Support with attendance

Schools from across York have worked closely together with the City of York Council to develop a city-wide attendance strategy.

You can see their Attendance Matters flyer here.