A Case Study on Attendance
Ysgol Gynradd Gymraeg Pontardawe, Neath Port Talbot
Background:
The school’s attendance figures over the last five years have fallen and certainly the Covid lockdown has affected the data. Over the past two years school attendance is beginning to show positive progress as a result of a number of county and national strategies. In 2018/19, school attendance was 95%. By 21-22, this was 91.63%. Today, the school’s attendance shows improvement and a trend of progress compared to the previous year.
Data:
2018/19: 95%
2019/2020: 94.24%
2020/2021: 94.86%
2021/2022: 91.63%
2022/2023: 92.21%
Procedures and their effect
Ysgol Gynradd Gymraeg Pontardawe has seen a positive impact this year in terms of attendance figures with an improvement of +1.37% compared to the first year following the lockdown period. This is true of all attendance data for Neath Port Talbot with an increase of +2.27% since the lockdown period.
The school uses county guidelines as well as internal processes in order to target parents, vulnerable pupils and reconnect with families who caused distress.
The school will follow the revised policy on the county’s new ‘Attendance and Punctuality’ and ensure close contact with the county’s Welfare Officer. The meetings are held monthly either face to face or virtually on TEAMS. The purpose of these meetings is to discuss the attendance levels of pupils who are below 90% when notifying stage 1 and 2 letters.
Step 1 Letter:
An initial letter informing that the child’s level of attendance is below the school’s expectations/target. Improvement required within 1 month.
Step 2 letter:
This letter is a second notification if attendance levels have not improved since the initial letter. With the majority of cases, this is the final step.
Step 3:
A formal meeting with the headteacher, parents and the Welfare Officer present. Discuss attendance levels and an opportunity to build a relationship to resolve reasons for the child’s absence.
Referral to the Well-being team:
This is the last step in the process, if there is no improvement in terms of the child’s attendance levels, the school draws up a request to refer to the welfare team. This is where parents can receive external support/social services.
School:
The school appreciates that parents’ attitudes to attendance have been greatly affected since the lockdown period. They choose not to send their children to school and take children out of school for unauthorised holidays. This has a detrimental effect on the child’s well-being not to mention general attendance at school.
The school offers several procedures and please note below:
*Employing a Therapy Dog 1 school day for 3 hours
*Employing a Parental Involvement Officer for two days a week
*Weekly Parents Cafe
*Weekly Ti a Fi cycle
*Wellness ‘App’ used by pupils on a daily basis
*Process of analysing pupils’ well-being feelings
*Celebrating the best attendance in the class on a weekly basis
*Parents receive an attendance summary once every half term
Certainly these procedures have a positive effect on raising and improving the levels of attendance rates at the school although the school would have liked to see more concrete progress we are on the right track. The biggest investment was the appointment of a Parent Involvement Officer. The main purpose of the role is to promote and improve parental contact by holding informal meetings, offering support and family visits at home. This is where parents can be directed to help in a homely atmosphere without feeling threatened in order to solve and / or find reasons why the children do not attend school regularly. In a short period of time, we have seen families who were upset by not bringing their children to school regularly much more open to sharing their worries or problems. This has had a positive effect on the school. We have seen that a significant number of parents do not reach beyond stage 2 in the school’s attendance and punctuality policy.