Education And Long term sickness

[ghostsandghoulies]

Dis is y8 and in a state school.

He is currently too ill to go to school and has not been at school since 5th November. He does not have a diagnosis for his illness and doesn't seem to be getting better.

School have requested a meeting with me. Can anybody advise me what may happen? Are they going to ask him to leave? What is the maximum amount of time that they'll keep his spot for him?

Thank you.

[MsAwesomeDragon]

They will be concerned about his absence and will hopefully be wanting to offer support.

Have you kept them informed? Does he have a doctor's note? Are the doctors doing tests?

[ghostsandghoulies]

I am in weekly contact with the scho and the GP provided a note to say that he had seen and examined ds.

I think that they are genuinely worried about him but I've not been through this situation before so wondered if there was a standard procedure or offering that they would make.

[MsAwesomeDragon]

I don't really think there's a standard offering. They're going to want to do what's best for him, so that will be pretty individual. I know my school have in the past offered reduced timetable for kids who might manage half days but can't cope with full days. Or we sometimes manage to send a tutor with some work for certain subjects, for a short ish period.

You don't need to worry about them asking him to leave, they aren't allowed to do that. They will keep his place as long as you need, and will keep in contact with you to check on his progress.

[dontletmedowngently]

DD had to have 4 weeks off from mid-September this year for a knee operation. Her school set her up with a log in for an online learning service which meant she was able to keep up to date fairly well in most of her subjects. It also meant that as long as they could see that she’d spent 4 hours a day on it they were able to give her an attendance mark for that day. Once she was able to go back they let her do half days for the first week to ease her in gently.

I hope he starts getting better soon.

[ladyorangemarmalade]

Sorry that your ds is unwell op.
They won't ask him to leave. Just keep providing them with copies of the GP notes and make sure that his absence is not unauthorised.

[greencatbluecat]

Hope your DS is better soon.

Take photos of all medical evidence - letters obviously but also blood test forms, prescriptions etc.

You may well get a nasty letter from the educational welfare officer of your county saying that it is your legal responsibility etc to send DS to school. Schools take absence very seriously because they are under a lot of pressure from OFSTED to keep attendance to 95% and obviously your DS' is now far below this.

My DD had about 2 weeks off school and we got this letter, even though in the previous 2 years she'd only had 1 day off.

[ghostsandghoulies]

I had the meeting today. It was not at all the scary experience that I feared.

They were actually really sympathetic to us and wanted to offer lots of help in getting him back to school. He's basically allowed to turn up when he's feeling ok and leave when he's feeling not ok. They said that even if he stays for half a lesson that's ok which surprised him.

[greencatbluecat]

That's good OP. Your school was obviously far more sympathetic than mine.

[Miscible]

Is he getting anything like home tuition? The local authority should be arranging this for him if he can cope with it.

[youarenotkiddingme]

Have a look online. There are laws about alternative tutoring and medical school for a child once they have had 15 days absence of they have a doctors letter.

Also a school cannot remove a child from their books - it's called off rolling and is illegal.

It is the responsibility of the school and LA to provide him an education.

[Gumbo]

I have a DC in Y8 who hasn't been to school much for 7 months due to illness. The school were initially quite pushy about getting him back in but have backed off since we called their bluff when they threatened to get welfare officers etc involved - we told them we would welcome this since nobody wants DC to get back to school more than us!

We keep in touch with the teachers on a daily basis...the good ones send through work which we send back, homework gets done and submitted in good time, and even assessments get sent home to be done! DS goes in for or 2 lessons a day now (it's gradually increasing and we aim for attending the core subject lessons where possible).

We've got Parents Evening coming up soon which should be interesting!

[itdoesnthavetobefun]

I echo what previous poster said. Contact the medical needs dept of your local authority. There is a legal obligation to provide education after 15 days, but it took mine over a year!

ds now has a diagnosis of ME, and we are just now, 2 years down the line, starting to get things properly sorted!

Hope you are coping OK, it's hard seeing them so ill, and especially hard when it's unclear what the diagnosis is.