School attendance process

Attendance meetings

Schools will have termly attendance meetings with Attendance Support Team (AST) Single Point of Contact (SPOC). 3 meetings a year as a minimum will be offered and held.

AST targeting support meetings will take place, which discuss trends, data, emerging school needs, pupil cohorts and individual pupils.

Actions identified

Where attendance is a cause for concern AST SPOC will be available to attend Children in Need, Child Protection, Youth Justice Service, Children Looked After multi-agency meetings and support with advice and guidance.

Attendance meeting will be scheduled for following term.

SPOC available to school for advice, guidance, and free training support to staff. A daily Attendance Helpline is available.

Tier 1: attendance of 100%-93%

Schools monitor, track and implement early intervention attendance strategies including recognising improved attendance.

Tier 2: attendance of 92%-80%

Where complex or additional needs are identified, schools are to embed attendance as a key priority in Additional Needs Plans (ANP) for monitoring. If there is no ANP in place, school must commence ANP immediately.

Schools will identify cohorts for in-school group support, mentoring support, and parent-school meetings.

School to complete an Assess Plan Do Review (APDR) form and pupil voice for pupils with attendance 92% and below.

Please see guidance notes for APDR.

School to hold regular reviews and facilitate supportive interventions.

Where there is no improvement and attendance drops below 80%, schools will need to initiate an attendance support plan to be reviewed within a 3 to 4 week period for further interventions to be considered, including formal warning of Fixed Penalty Notice (FPN) if deemed appropriate.

Tier 3: attendance of 79%-51%

School and AST SPOC identify targeted groups and emerging needs.

Time-limited targeted group work will be agreed and undertaken by allocated AST practitioner.

Schools will formalise with Attendance Parent Contract if there is no improvement in attendance and all supportive measures have been exhausted. School can consider statutory interventions or referral to level 3 Early Help as appropriate.

On review of Attendance Parent Contract, if attendance has failed to improve, schools should compile all the supportive measures offered and provided, including plans of support, and other relevant documents as evidence for legal intervention if deemed appropriate.

Schools will need to consult AST SPOC when legal interventions are being considered as the next step.

The AST SPOC can be contacted to discuss your decisions and a Legal Interventions Referral form will be provided to the school by the AST SPOC.

Tier 4: attendance of 50% or lower

Early Help Keywork– 12 – 20-week intervention

All referral criteria must be met prior to a referral being made by the school via SPOA Portal using the SOR form.

If a referral is declined, information, advice, and guidance will be provided to the referring school and parents from Level 2 Early Help.

For cases accepted, an Early Help Plan will be developed with family and school. Support will be reviewed at end of a 20-week period. The aim of the intensive support is to gain sustained change and improvement. 

This will be handed back to school to monitor at the end of the intervention.

Schools retain responsibility to take legal action-working with the AST Legal Intervention Panel.