Attendance is really important not just in school but later in life too. We continually work hard with you to ensure children attend well, get the most from their learning and develop good habits for adult life. Children in our school get very excited to be nominated best attending class of the week, which is great to see!
Attendance in our school has improved and we are very grateful to parents for supporting us in this. We do need to further reduce unauthorised absence and so the Governing Board decided this year to enforce part of our attendance policy to reduce and discourage holiday absence. (The attendance policy can be found below.)
Any holiday request that is not authorised as an exceptional circumstance by the Headteacher will be referred to the attendance team at the local authority who may choose to issue a penalty notice and fine parents. If this happens repeatedly (or if parents don't pay fines) the local authority may also take parents immediately to court.
Please help us improve children's attendance and help you avoid the above action by not taking holiday in term time. The Education (Pupil Registration) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2013 state that Headteachers should not grant approval for any leave of absence during term-time, including holidays, unless there are exceptional circumstances. These regulations also state that holidays cannot be authorised retrospectively. Any requests should be on an official school absence request form and handed into the school office for consideration prior to any holiday/leave arrangements being made. You may be issued with a Penalty Notice should leave be taken which is not authorised. If unpaid this could lead to prosecution under section 444(1) of The Education Act 1996.
If you do need to take you child out of school during term time for exceptional circumstances please ask the office for a leave of absence at least 2 week's before the leave/absence is required and we advise parents not to book holidays until they have submitted this form and had a return letter from the Headteacher.
See the below (and our Attendance Policy) for further information.