Attendance

The Education Access Service is here to help both us and parents meet the obligations and duties placed on us by successive education acts and childcare legislation. Every school in Shropshire has an education welfare officer allocated to their school.

They each have their own 'patch' giving them responsibility for a number of schools, where they assess and advise on the managing of whole school attendance.

Education welfare officers will monitor whole school attendance on a regular basis and request information on all children with less than 90% attendance.

 

Access to education- Absence reporting- Statutory returns

As you will be aware in August 2024 Working together to improve school attendance was launched, this placed upon schools’ additional requirements for reporting 10- and 15-day absences.

10-15 Day Reporting

 

10-day unauthorised absence.

There is now a requirement for schools to complete an absence return for pupils who have been absent for a continuous period of ten school days where their absence has been recorded with one or more of the codes statistically classified as unauthorised (G, N, O, and/or U).

We will collate this information for the purposes of ensuring schools are fulfilling their duty to track, trace and have followed appropriate reporting process and consideration has been given to EHAST/FPOC. We will notify your named EWO(if assigned) to follow up any appropriate actions that may not have been undertaken in line with guidance.

Return deadline: Please can this be completed on the last Friday of every month.

15-day authorised absence. Please note this is for a data drop only- no action will be taken on this return in relation to S19 duties.

Sickness returns: providing the local authority with the full name and address of all pupils of compulsory school age who have been recorded with code I (illness) and who the school has reasonable grounds to believe will miss 15 days consecutively or cumulatively because of sickness. The LA are required to monitor and ensure consideration has been made by schools in relation to the guidance regards children who can’t attend because of health needs / mental health/EOTAS/EBSA. In addition to support school and the local authority to agree any provision needed to ensure continuity of education for pupils who cannot attend because of health needs, in line with the statutory guidance on arranging education for children who cannot attend school because of health.

Return deadline: Only one sickness return is required for a continuous period of sickness in a school year.

S19 duty - requests will need to be considered and consulted via the referral process- Inclusion pathway – available on the EAS webpage.

If you require any support or guidance, please consult with your named EWO or Jo Smith - Lead Education Officer – SAST.

 

---

 

Statutory Intervention Request 

If this is Statutory Intervention Request, please remember to send Statutory Intervention Request and any supporting evidence to eas@shropshire.gov.uk.

Please ensure the subject line of the email is: Statutory Intervention Request (Initials of Child & DOB)

 

 

---