WE VALUE GOOD Attendance!
Good attendance, and being on time every morning, is very important. When a child is in school, he/she has the best possible chance of learning and making progress. Absence and/or lateness can cause gaps in learning and may mean that a child fails to get the best out of his/her precious time in school.
Good attendance means that children gain maximum benefit from school. This not only results in strong learning and progress - it boosts confidence & social skills too.
We know that sometimes, of course, absence is unavoidable. But, we work hard with parents and children to ensure that attendance is as strong as possible.
What parents/carers should do
- Make sure you child is always on time for school.
- Schedule appointments (dentists, etc) out of school hours if possible.
- Please do not allow your child odd days off for birthdays, shopping, visiting relatives etc. This may sound unheard of to some parents/carers, but the evidence shows that it happens in some schools!
- Please do not take holidays in term-time. Children get 13 weeks official annual holiday. Note that from September 2013, the Department for Education took away the power of schools to grant leave for term-time leave of absence (except in 'exceptional' circumstances).
- If absence is unavoidable - for example if your child is ill - please inform the school promptly, on the morning of the first day of absence.
What school will do
- We will monitor all attendance, and provide every parent/carer with a half-termly report on your child's attendance.
- If we don't hear from you on your child's first day of absence, we will ring you (but we'd prefer it if you'd call us!).
- For families where attendance becomes a concern, we will ask parents/carers to come into school to meet the Head and/or Deputy Head for a discussion.
- We will provide parents with a weekly class-by-class & whole-school attendance report (in the Weekly Update).
- We will provide attractive incentives for good attendance - weekly awards, termly certificates and so on. Click here to read more about our award system for attendance.
Please work with us to make attendance a real strength of GPS!
