Attendance is one of the biggest challenges facing our schools this year – and soldiering on is not the answer, says Geoff Barton

Welcome back to the start of an autumn term that has already been overshadowed by the government’s chaotic handling of the issue of crumbling concrete in around 100 schools.

If one of them is your school, then our best wishes. You deserved better and earlier support than a last-minute scramble by the Department for Education (DfE) to put out some guidance a couple of days before term begins.

Aside from this debacle – and let’s hope it is an issue that is now speedily resolved – the single biggest challenge in the year ahead is probably pupil attendance, or to be more accurate non-attendance.

Among the blizzard of statistics around this vexed issue, there is one that stands out because it is so alarming. The persistent absence rate – that is the number of pupils who missed 10% or more of their possible sessions – was 22.3% in England’s schools last year – rising to 28.3% in secondary schools (DfE, 2023).

Pre-pandemic – in 2018/19 – the corresponding figure was 10.9% (13.7% for secondaries).

The increase is staggering. The rate of persistent absenteeism has more than doubled.

 

Unsettling trend

The question is why? Of course, you will have seen this unsettling trend playing out at first hand in your schools, and you will probably know better than me the factors that lie behind the figures.

The data certainly tells part of that story. This is that illness absence rates remain higher than pre-pandemic levels.

UK Health Security Authority data shows that a number of illnesses all peaked at around the same time in December. In the autumn term, 13.4% of pupils were persistently absent solely due to illness – compared to 5% in autumn 2019 – and while the rate decreased in the spring and summer term it was still very significant.

However, illness is only one part of the picture. Once that has been accounted for there is still a big group of pupils left who are persistently absent for other reasons.

And what exactly lies behind all of this is, of course, difficult to discern from statistics alone.

 

Wide of the mark

But I would hazard a guess that within these figures there are a great many children who are struggling with their mental health and wellbeing, or who have simply not returned to the normal patterns of education since the disruption of the pandemic.

This is why I think that the advice of schools minister Nick Gibb in an article in The Sun (Gibb, 2023) urging parents to send their children to school if they have a minor cough or cold is wide of the mark.

Much of what he says in his article is admirable – persistent absenteeism does have a serious long-term impact on a child’s life prospects, and we do need parents to take a stand on absenteeism.

But the factors which are driving this problem go much deeper than whether or not a child should go to school with a minor sniffle.

My sense is that many of these young people and their families are struggling with profound problems which are exacerbated by the impact of the cost-of-living crisis.

What they need is more specialist, pastoral and mental health support. And what schools need is the support of more attendance officers, people who are out in the community knocking on doors and talking directly to parents and carers.

But this all costs money of course and this is the perpetual problem that we have with the government’s handling of the challenges which face our sector.

 

Austerity policies

The funding made available by the government for education recovery following the pandemic was clearly inadequate.

And this is compounded by long-running problems in accessing specialist children’s mental health services, the erosion of local authority services as a result of austerity policies, and the unsustainable pressure on SEND budgets.

In short, we have a rising tide of mental health problems, a cost-of-living crisis which is placing ever-more pressure on struggling families, and a creaking infrastructure of state support that is just not able to deal with these issues.

 

What then is to be done?

Schools, of course, have an important role to play in encouraging good attendance, but my impression is that they are already at full stretch pulling every lever they possibly can. It is surely the factors beyond the school gate that must be addressed.

 

Follow the evidence

What we really need is for the government to carry out a proper review which seeks to better understand the reasons for high rates of absence, and a commitment to follow the evidence with funded support.

Experience tells us that ministers will balk at the potentially sizeable costs involved. But what is the cost of not taking action? Reduced life chances of many young people and a long-term impact on the skills-base of the nation.

Positive action will also pay dividends in many other ways – improving behaviour, meeting the individual needs of children, and raising attainment. This is surely an investment rather than a cost.

Soldiering on through coughs and colds just isn’t enough. We need more than a stiff upper lip.

Geoff Barton is general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders. Read his previous articles for SecEd, via www.sec-ed.co.uk/authors/geoff-barton/

 

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