Attendance

1. Aims

Our school aims to meet obligations with regards to school attendance by:

• Promoting good attendance and reducing absence, including persistent absences.
• Acting early to address patterns of absence.
• We will also support parents to perform their legal duty of ensuring children of compulsory school age attend regularly, and will support punctuality in attending lessons.
• Students at EIC are expected to attend at least 95% of school days.

2. School procedures

2.1 Attendance register

The iSAMS attendance register will be taken at the start of each school day at 8:45 am during registration. 

Every entry in the attendance register will be preserved for 3 years after the date on which the entry was made.

Pupils must arrive at school by 8:40 am on each school day.

The register for the first session will be taken at 8:45 am and will be kept open until 8:55 am. Students will be marked "Late" if they are not present at the start of the registration period.

2.2 Unplanned absence

Parents must notify the school on the first day of an unplanned absence (for example, if their child is unable to attend due to ill health) by 8:15am or as soon as practically possible (see section 6). Parents will need to message their child's form tutor/class teacher and reception@eic.edu. 

Absence due to illness will be authorized by students bringing a note from the parents or a comment entered in the students' diary in Firefly. 

2.3 Medical or dental appointments

Missing registration for a medical or dental appointment may be counted as an authorised absence, however, we require advance notice (to form tutor/reception) for authorising these absences.  We encourage parents to make medical and dental appointments out of school hours where possible. Where this is not possible, the pupil should be out of school for the minimum amount of time necessary.

Applications for other types of absence in term time must also be made in advance to the Principal (principal@eic.edu).

2.4 Lateness and punctuality

A pupil who arrives late, but before the register has closed will be marked as late, using the appropriate code (L). Students who miss the registration window will need to sign in at reception. 

2.5 Following up absence

The school will follow up any absences to ascertain the reason, ensure proper safeguarding action is taken where necessary, identify whether the absence is approved or not and identify the correct attendance code to use.

2.6 Reporting to parents

Each child’s attendance record will be communicated annually in the written end-of-year report, or via a termly written report.

3. Authorised and unauthorised absence

3.1 Granting approval for long-term absence

The Principal may not grant any leave of absence to pupils during term time unless they consider there to be 'exceptional circumstances'. 

We define ‘exceptional circumstances’ as a medical or family/personal emergency. 

The school considers each application for term-time absence individually, taking into account the specific facts, circumstances and relevant context behind the request. A leave of absence is granted entirely at the principal's discretion.

Valid reasons for authorised absence include:

• Illness and medical/dental appointments
• Religious observance – where the day is exclusively set apart for religious observance by the religious body to which the pupil’s parents belong. If necessary, the school will seek advice from the parents’ religious body to confirm whether the day is set apart.

Examples of unauthorised absence:

• Term-time holiday will not be approved.

4. Strategies for promoting attendance

Students who obtain 100% each term will be awarded a certificate of attendance.

5. Attendance monitoring

The attendance officer monitors pupil absence on a daily basis.

Parents are expected to call the school in the morning if their child is going to be absent due to ill health. If a pupil’s absence through illness goes above [3] days we will contact the parents to discuss the reasons for this.

6. Roles and responsibilities

6.1 The Principal

The Principal is responsible for ensuring this policy is implemented consistently across the school, and for monitoring school-level absence data. The headteacher also supports other staff in monitoring the attendance of individual pupils.

6.2 The Attendance Officer

The Attendance Officer:

• Monitors attendance data at the school and individual pupil level.
• Reports concerns about attendance to the Principal/Key Stage Managers.
• Follows up and communicates notification/concerns letters to parents.
• Arranges calls and meetings with parents to discuss attendance issues.

6.3 Class teachers/form tutors

Class teachers/Form tutors are responsible for recording attendance on a daily basis, using the correct codes, and submitting this information to the school office.

6.4 [Office/reception] staff

Office/Reception staff may be expected to take calls from parents about absence and record it on the school system.

7. Monitoring arrangements

This policy will be reviewed each term by the Principal and members of the SLT.

8. Links with other policies

This policy is linked to our child protection and safeguarding policies.

Appendix 1

Communications and reminders to be sent to parents (sent/monitored by the Attendance Officer). 

- To students whose attendance falls well below 95% over the course of the year (to be sent and checked each half term).

- To students who are late three times in 10 school days.

- To students who are marked absent (N -non authorized) twice in 10 days.