Working Together to Improve School Attendance released
The DfE have published new guidance which applies from 19 August 2024 ‘Working together to improve school attendance’
The guidance is for:
- All school and academy trust staff, headteachers, governors, academy trustees, and alternative provision providers
- Local authority attendance staff, early help lead practitioners, social workers, and virtual school heads
- Statutory safeguarding (including police and integrated care boards) and other local partners
- This guidance may also be useful for parents and carers
The guidance follows the School attendance consultation response – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) and includes the new expectations of schools and of local authority services.
Summary of changes are:
- Clarity of expectations: all Schools, trusts and local authorities will all have clearly defined statutory roles set out in a table of responsibilities
- Earlier intervention: all Schools will have legal responsibilities to proactively improve attendance for the first time (beyond existing requirements to record accurately) underpinned by timelier sharing of attendance data
- Support first: all pupils and parents, no matter where they live in the country, will have clear expectations from their school, be regularly informed about their child’s attendance and have access to early intervention and support first before any legal action if it becomes problematic
- Targeted whole family support: attendance teams in the local authority will work in tandem with early help to provide a whole-family response with a single assessment, plan, and lead practitioner
- Independent schools: data will be collected for the first time and will start to receive support from the local authority
For a copy, pleas click here.
