ATTENDANCE

POLICY

OCTOBER 2015

Responsibility / Head Teacher
Date of last review / 01/10/2015
Date of next review by / 30/09/2016
  1. INTRODUCTION

At The Aspire Academy we recognise the importance of the link between attainment and attendance. Good attendance is necessary for students to be able to reach their full potential and gain the most from their time spent with us. The success of many other policies such as the SEN policy, Behaviour policy and Curriculum policy depends upon good attendance. Therefore, attendance cannot be seen in isolation from the whole of a child’s educational experience and is key to engagement, enjoyment and success.

  1. RATIONALE
  • The Aspire Academy basis its Attendance Policy on the Guidelines set out by Worcester Local Authority.
  • Whilst the legal responsibility for regular school attendance rests with parents, The Aspire Academy shares with them, responsibility for encouraging good attendance and improving poor attendance.
  1. OBJECTIVES

To convey clearly to parents and students that:

  • Regular attendance is essential
  • Unauthorised absence and persistent lateness are not acceptable and will affect their child’s progress
  • Only The Aspire Academy in the context of the law can approve absence.
  • Parentally condoned, unjustifiable absence will be investigated and may be recorded as unauthorised absence.

To keep records of attendance which:

  • Clearly distinguish between authorised and unauthorised absence by students
  • Provide accurate information on actual attendance to enable monitoring and evaluation of The Aspire Academy attendance rates through centrally held statistics.
  • To build on existing good practice that fosters a positive attitudeto good attendance by:
  • Responding rapidly to student absence
  • Recognising students who maintain ‘excellent’, ‘good’ and ‘improving’ attendance records
  • To be sensitive to situations where regular attendance patterns are disrupted by external factors (i.e. difficulties with transport)
  • Where attendance has been affected by poor behaviour on the transport, to ensure these issues are addressed in order to improve the situation.
  1. PRINCIPLES & PROCEDURES

The Aspire Academy will make its policy on attendance clear to home schools, parents and students through:

  • The interview procedure prior to admission
  • The prominence of good attendance as a target in the School Improvement Plan
  • Letters to parents addressing specific aspects of attendance and requiring parental response, parent and student interview in the case of repeated, unexplained absences.
  • The use of first day calling to ensure that the reasons for absence are ascertained and action taken promptly
  • Ensuring the role of other relevant support services is known and understood.
  • Clear systems and procedures that will govern response to all student absence
  • A reward system that emphasises good and improving attendanceThe Aspire Academy will be alert and responsive to the range of factors that can affect attendance and put strategies in place to address the barriers to good attendance.
  1. TARGET SETTING
  • Improving attendance will be a target for those students for whom this has been a previous issue and therefore a barrier to their learning.
  • Improving attendance and/or maintaining good attendance will be a target for each of our students.
  • Home schools will receive daily, weekly and termly attendance information on their students. Access to the Aspire MIS through a parent portal for school links allows access to attendance information.
  • Attendance rates will be reported to home the Governors of The Aspire Academy
  1. MONITORING
  • Registers are the only official means of monitoring students’ attendance and must therefore be kept accurately, using only the permitted codes.
  • Students’ attendance patterns will be regularly monitored by the SLT and reviewed. Any concern will be followed up with the student/parent or carer.
  • Matters of concern should be referred to the SLT without delay.
  1. CONCLUSION

Poor attendance is detrimental to educational achievement and results in less favourable outcomes for students in terms of their attainment, engagement in education, employment and training and students’ social and emotional wellbeing. It is essential that good attendance is given the highest priority and that all members of staff understand their role, along with that of other agencies and parents/carers, in working in partnership with The Aspire Academy to promote the highest standards of attendance, achievement and success.

APPENDIX A

CALCULATION OF ATTENDANCE

Attendance percentages will be calculated from the number of individual sessions as a fraction of contracted sessions.

STUDENTS REINTEGRATING

  • During reintegration programmes, students remain on the roll of The Aspire academy are marked as D, dual registered when not The Aspire academy
  • Students’ attendance will be monitored on a weekly basis by contacting the host school/provision and obtaining the daily mark and keeping on the students file.

STUDENTS ON SHARED PROGRAMMES WITH SCHOOLS

  • Attendance at the Aspire Academy requires a ( / ) or ( \ ) mark.
  • Schools will be responsible for checking attendance at The Aspire Academy on a weekly basis.
  • The Aspire Academy will provide the school with a record of attendance on a weekly basis.

KEY STAGE 4 STUDENTS

Within our Key Stage 4 provision students are offered tailored learning programmes within the following settings:

  • Archway Academy, Worcester
  • Bridge Training and Development, Hanley Swan
  • Gloverspiece Minifarm, Ladywood, Nr. Droitwich
  • Heart of Worcestershire College
  • Longlands Care Farm, Whitbourne, Worcs.
  • Session Skills, Worcester
  • Wildgoose Rural Training, Holt, Worcs

RECORDING ATTENDANCE

Our off-site learning providers register students via CLM (Collaborative Learning Manager), an online attendance and student management system. Student attendance is completed within one hour of the start of each session and can be instantly accessed in school. These attendance marks are then manually transferred across to our Arbor registers. Changes to the status of students during the session will be reported to The Aspire Academy, via the online register. If the CLM register is offline, attendance will be reported to The Aspire Academy via email and telephone.

The Aspire Academy – Attendance PolicyPage 1