If you work in education, what do you think is causing the current attendance issues?

[NeedAnUpgrade]

I’ve read quite a lot on this recently. DD1 is 10, she’s always been reluctant to go to school. She had a spate of UTIs, stomach aches, headaches etc. She’s had a bit of time off sick but we only triggered the attendance letter recently as it went below a certain threshold. DH and I have always done our best to get her into school, being reassured that she’s ‘been fine all day’ by her teachers. It all came to a head this year (yr 5) after a complete meltdown, several anxiety attacks and refusal to leave the house. She’s now on a reduced timetable at school and on the waiting list for an ASD assessment.
Academically she’s ahead but just can’t seem to cope with the school environment.

I’m just wondering what those who work in education think the issues are. Am I just a terrible parent? Although I’m not sure what else I could do. I suspect a complete lack of funding in education has had the biggest impact on schools and students. Especially those with SEN.

which ones? Find me an autism expert who thinks that mainstream schooling is GOOD for autistic children?

Also do they agree with your suggestion upthread that many autistic children have, in fact, been misdiagnosed?

Not attending school doesn't mean they miss out on an education.

I didn't go to any of my lectures and missed many of my seminars, still got a first and still got a good job after I graduated.

But frankly that attitude to getting a degree highlights all that's wrong with how people think about education - it's all to get a well paid job and not at all about loving learning for its own sake.

Do you think that scenario is common?

It certainly was for nearly everyone I went to uni with, yes. I don't know anyone who graduated with less than a 2:1.

And none of them attended any lectures at all? That seems very improbable.

Honestly?

School are sickeningly underfunded

Too many children with SEN are waiting years for a diagnosis, so the schools don’t get the funding they need for those children - because of this under trained TA’s are trying their best to support multiple children with very limited, if any, resources whilst teachers are desperately trying to teach to an unrealistic curriculum.

Classrooms are not the safe and nurturing environments children need.

If parents want change they need to start voting for parties who prioritise education unless they can afford to send their children to private school.

Mine went through a stage post-lock down of not liking school - found the kids were noisy/disruptive after all that time at home; also felt that as the teachers still post everything to Teams for/after each lesson, that he doesn’t miss that much when he’s off.

Of course, there are teachers he felt/feels give value-added and he’s always made it in for their lessons, but if he knows he has a day where there are no science practicals and the lessons will be filled by subs (ie he’ll be reading/taking notes from a text book or working through Seneca.com), why bother leaving the house? (His thought process, not mine.)

Once his friendships re-established, however, this shifted and going in to see friends has finally become a draw for him, especially as his GCSEs approach and the attendance grade might have had a material impact on his acceptance at the 6th form he really wanted to go to.

By contrast, for next year, he actually applied for a boarding place at a state 6th form so that he can be sure not to miss a single lesson (he suffers from migraines, is on the spectrum and had covid 4 times, along with a post viral illness) as he is now so keen - and can see that it all ‘matters’ now he has a career/uni goal.

So, in summary, I think kids need to understand how what they are doing today feeds into their future, they need to have plans for their futures, they need to feel the staff are truly invested in their learning such that they will miss out if they don’t attend their lessons. I also think that they need to feel valued, rather than under a barrage of demerits for trivial misdemeanours in a punitive and controlling system that has little to do with education or preparing children for their adult role in society.

I just don’t recognise a lot of stuff that is being posted here. Schools aren’t all the awful places they are being made out to be. My 3 have overall have had a positive time at school. The main problems they have faced has actually been the behaviour of other students.

There have of course been challenges, especially for my son with SEN, it has felt very difficult at times but we work together as a family to overcome it and move on. Life will always be full of challenges, my job is to help them develop the skills to adapt and cope with whatever life throws at them.

I have definitely noticed a tendency amongst the parents of my youngest child to catastrophise about everything - the class WhatsApp group is constantly full of parents stressing about everything, which is something I definitely didn’t experience with my oldest. I am sure the children must be picking up on this stress. The WhatsApp groups are supposed to be helpful for sharing information, but end up becoming parents whipping each other up into a frenzy over fairly minor things, and also in my opinion parents getting involved in things far too much, instead of letting their child develop the ability to cope with it themselves.

If you loved learning though why no lectures?

Did you just read and do tutorials. I can’t imagine skipping all lectures - although probably changed since they are often put online these days

Lectures were optional for the subject I was doing (English). You really didn't need to attend
the lectures in order to write lucid and intelligent essays. Hence a lot of us didn't.

Pretty much. I read absolutely loads, way more than the set texts. I found lectures dull and inaccessible for the most part.

I’m not disagreeing it can become addictive but we’re talking about autism and other autism umbrella diagnoses. What might seem to be addictive in a negative way (your example of smoking for example) can be a positive ‘addiction’ for people with SEND.

For example, my autistic DS is addicted to rules & logic and so he makes his bed beautifully every day, brushes his teeth for the full amount of recommended time, sets out his cookware in a very neat way etc. Not because he wants to but because he’s following rules he’s set himself.

At some point he learnt that his rule addiction can encroach on our every day family life so he has to then alter and adapt (some things, not everything) but one thing we’ve never stopped is his screen time. He’s 18 and pretty much by the age of 9/10, he was able to regulate his own screen time.

For him, screen time is how he socialises and how he learns the incredible amount of information he retains in his head. Without screen time, some people won’t be able to self regulate.

Screens are often a lifeline & a window into the world.

I'm not in London either. Also, I don't think the other roles people look at are necessarily well paid, but they really won't have to be in order to be no worse remunerated by the hour. Student and early career teachers are expected to put in a huge number of hours. Especially given that teaching requires the PGCE too, so that has to be factored into the financial costs. You aren't necessarily going to be any better off than someone working the same hours in an hourly wage job.

In the past, the argument would've been that having the profession would ultimately pay for itself. But now the retention rates are so much lower, that can no longer be assumed.

@stormy4319trevor the requirement for a first class degree is an interesting point of view that sort of makes sense on paper but doesn't necessarily translate to success in real life. Just because someone "excels" academically does not make them a great teacher. I think it's a common idea that subject knowledge is the biggest part of being a teacher. I know so many that try and fail in the profession because they're just not the right kind of personality for it (regardless of qualifications - in fact you could say that over achieving in everything and loving school might make it harder to identify/empathise with a child who struggles with learning difficulties and comes from a traumatic background who is not interested in school). You don't even have to be qualified to teach these days to become a teacher and I expect it's attitudes such as this that have helped that to become a thing.

Also, I find the idea that getting a 2:1 somehow renders you an unemployable failure that has to reluctantly succumb to choosing teaching as the "easy option" is fairly out there. I reckon most teachers would tell you it was anything but an easy option. Clearly the idea that "it's easy" is a common one though as it would explain why so many people train to teach and then don't actually teach!

It's fascinating reading posts on here that range from people saying kids don't want to go to school because it's pointless and qualifications count for nothing these days to others saying you'll be hung out to dry in this world with anything less than a first at uni.

This is silly. There are clearly lots of jobs that aren't at all like school.

@NeedAnUpgrade i agree with you

i also think many neuro divergent people who have capacity are able to find a line of work and working environment that suits them.

i work in a senior corporate environment and have worked in plenty of places that do strategy and research and I work alongside lawyers etc.

office environments that are often so quiet they have a monastic air, plenty of people who rarely speak just gong deep in their spreadsheets or documents.

anyway i have a family member going through similar to your daughter. My take:

I think she and your DD sound neuro divergent and maybe issues would have come up anyway

however I think the pandemic made it worse in the following ways:

• it somehow broke the ‘spell’ of school, that sense that this was a norm and they must go
• It’s had impacts on other kids in other ways so classroom behaviour is worse, which makes it a harder environment for these kids to be in
• its had impacts on teachers

and then schools are generally under resourced which creates further pressure on teachers and support teams

so schools are less able to cope with more demanding pupils.

i also think the ‘zero tolerance to absence’ is new. When I was at school in the 1990s plenty of teens bunked off and not much was done. Likely some of them were ND and self selecting themselves out of environments that they couldn’t cope with.

these kids were always there, they were just ignored.

i know one family who have withdrawn their ND son and he is now successfully doing online schooling (they are paying for it) and it requires someone at home.

if I were you I wouldn’t rush to that.

i would consider seeking a private diagnosis to get insight into triggers etc faster.

and I’d look for private help to figure out the right path for her. There are some specialists that offer a kind of 360 look at what environment and interventions will help and support you to create the path towards them. But again self funded.

I’d also reassure her. It won’t always be like this, she will find her place in the world.

you May have to fake it until you make it.

but if she’s anxious already, if you worry and panic so will she

I don't work in education but I am a mother of 3 children, WFH during the lockdown.

This thread is interesting as I am wondering this lately. I hear more and more cases in my kids school (have two in secondary and one in primary with no issues of this nature so far).
From my non expert opinion it has nothing to do with parenting. I have a close friend whose DD is going through this and she is an amazing mother. And you see parents who aren't great and kids are managing well so it's unfair to point a finger at parents.
I do agree it's ridiculous the amount of pressure kids are under these days. They need to accomplish lots at school, do sports and have a very tight schedule. I wonder if we are overdoing this.
Did covid triggered kids with anxiety problems? I would like to know this.

The basic framework is nearly always the same. Timekeeping, dress code, working alongside others, completing work you are told to complete.

She is bilingual, so language is not the problem, although sometimes when she is having a meltdown or is overwhelmed it is easier to speak to her in English.

I think for her, Covid showed the world, that the way we approach life can change, but only if it suits the right people. She is very intelligent, and looks at things differently. School asked so much of the students, invaded her privacy by coming into her home and dictating to her, mandatory covid tests, mandatory masks, getting rid of anything remotely fun at school. Now they don't want to help her, let her be bullied, all they are concerned about is academic test results, and playing catch up. She just can't cope, one minute they are so powerful they did all the covid stuff, and now so powerless to do anything help kids.

@Naptrappedmummy I was diagnosed autistic at aged 45 and adhd at 50. Secondary school was hell for me and I ended up with school phobia and sent to an adolescent psychiatric day unit. I self harmed, bunked off and developed crippling anxiety which had to be medicated. I developed psychosomatic illnesses as well which were painful and difficult to live with.

ND people have always been here, it's just that we had to learn to mask. Some of us literally had it beaten into us.
ND people are now massively struggling to mask due to the complex changes that society have undergone over about the last 15 or so years. The public's attitudes have changed, they're more aggressive, demanding, judgemental and difficult to deal with. Everything is louder, brighter, less predictable, more bureaucratic and complicated. Things change every few weeks/months. Nothing is reliable or predictable. The world feels as though it's gone to shit. I had to leave my 30 year career because I could no longer cope with the way the public began behaving in my workplace.

I estimate that around 1 in 15 people are probably ND. My dad was born in 1926 and was ND. We've always been here, it's just a different - and remarkably hostile to NDs - place now. Oh, and, screens certainly aren't the issue.

Dress code massively outdated these days in office workplaces. I wouldn't work anywhere that still had a dress code.

Autism and dyslexia were not mentioned in my post. I am just so concerned about the amount of children who have all these "labels" attached to them.
My dc are out of school environment now (10yrs). There just seems to have been an explosion of all these, once, uncommon afflictions.
WTF is going on!!. Are children from the more affluent areas/schools also affected by these issues, on this scale?

There's nothing wrong with having a "label". It's not a stigma. It's not something to be ashamed of.