Rewarding kids for attendance, yay or nay?

[DoubleBusy2026]

Hi I’m interested to hear (especially from teachers!) if I’m being over zealous on this?

DD has just started year 7 and had one day off 2 weeks ago after the usual ‘new term bug’ swept through school. She had been sick the night before but was fine that morning. It was me who insisted she stay at home as I have a highly comprised immune system so as you can imagine, I feel very strongly about how important it is to keep sick people away from others. The knock on effects for people like myself, can potentially be catastrophic. Life ending, to be blunt.

Anyway, the school have ‘Golden ticket’ draws a few times a year, whereby any student who doesn’t miss a single day for 3 weeks, wins a shopping voucher(!) and the first of these draws was for days 1-21 of the new term.
Seems a great idea, until kids start missing out through no fault of their own, then it becomes a punishment for being unwell; whether that was the intention or not.
What about children with chronic illnesses? Important medical appointments which can only take place during school hours?

Just to be crystal clear, I’m not angrily posting on Mumsnet because my child didn’t get a shopping voucher! DD has more pocket money than I do and is much more privileged than many children, she absolutely doesn’t need one. It’s 100% about the principle and about the knock on effects on others.. In my opinion, rewarding children for attendance, just encourages parents to send in their sick children which results in many more sick children; surely that’s counterproductive?!

As I said, my compromised immunity is why I find it difficult to understand the flawed logic behind rewarding children - some of whom will undoubtedly be sick and contagious in a large school - for attending.

Besides, DD was only ill because a student had vomited in the hallway right next to her on the first day! Then on the day she was off, it was me who had insisted that she stay at home, as she had vomited the night before. DD very much wanted to attend!

How do I explain to an Autistic child that she’s missing out on a reward because she was poorly and that if she had attended whilst still unwell, that she would’ve been rewarded? What message is that sending?

Anyway, I do understand the idea behind it. I just believe it to be incredibly flawed logic, that’s all. Like I said, I’m interested to hear others’ perspectives on it.
Please be kind! Obviously I’m not going to say anything to the school about it…

Edited for typo!

I'm a teacher and I loathe them. I know that attendance affects grades but this affects kids with chronic health issues and I'd rather they were in whenever they can be. There's loads of ways of rewarding kids, we don't need 100% attendance rewards. The government disagrees with teachers a lot of the time though and we have to do as they say.

As a teacher and parent, I see both sides. When they first started, genuine sick days weren't included as classed as authorised absence.

As usual, it's the minority whose parents who are irresponsible and don't get up to get their DC ready, let them out into the streets, yes other reasons we know, but fundamentally aimed at them as an initiative under the guise of attending. Reward rather penalise, hey parents, your child has come home buzzing about going to school more often to win form group for attending!

Then it becomes so obvious when tallied up weekly why a group will never win and this isn't the child's fault. Unfortunately these DC can't compete against their parents' lifestyle. SS and school liaison will be involved but not always successful.

So, in this aspect, yes it's actually quite cruel, but teachers do try to compensate with rewards of effort, oher achievements.

Speaking personally, ND DC going to school every day, on time, was a huge achievement so to be recognised by a certificate was encouraging and meant do much 👍

Pupils will of course be off ill or other circumstances, this is normal, and 100% attendance isn't the yardstick that it should be measured by. Reduce it to 90%, much fairer.

The teacher in me does however say it keeps the basic expectation to go to school in the limelight. Not for statistics rather than for DC to receive the full education they are entitled to, which is actually a privilege for many countries, the desperation and appreciation of going to school sponsored by many of us is such a contrast.

I'm all for it.

I think children should only be rewarded for things they personally control. Rewarding them for attendance in primary school is like rewarding them for living in a big house or having nice clothes.

Neither my DC's primary or secondary schools did this, presumably because attendance wasn't a big issue for them or they don't think it is an effective method. I was relieved though as my DS has long term medical conditions and in primary school in particular he missed a lot of time through illness. Even in secondary when he was much better he had quite a lot of appointments at a hospital over 100 miles away which necessitated full days off and he never managed 100% attendance. He would have got over it of course, but I would have felt it unfair if he had missed out on nice things because of his absences. Things were tough enough as it was for him when he was little and it could have been the straw that broke the camel's back if he'd felt penalised for it.
I can't really see the value to be honest. In primary school, particularly the younger years, I would think that attendance is largely driven by the parents rather than the children themselves and in secondary I doubt persistent absentees will be hugely influenced by attendance rewards.

I have always found these incentives ridiculous. Best to ignore them when a child is sick they can't attend school that's it! Its hard for an autistic child to understand this. Try to explain as best you can but you are doing the right thing. I work in a school and wish more parents kept their sick children off!

Big nay for me. My child has regular medical appointments, is sick more than most children etc and will never, ever get 100% attendance.

Nay here too, ds was in hospital twice over the last year and hated that they told him to watch his attendance next year on his report card

I feel like if the attendance reward only covers a three week period then it’s acceptable, as it discourages children from choosing to miss school because they haven’t done their homework or can’t be bothered!

I do however disagree with rewards only been given for a whole academic year of 100% attendance!

My daughter had never missed a day of primary school until she caught COVID at school, and in line with government guidance after testing positive with the self test kits and PCR postal test which confirmed it… she was in quarantine.

A few days after she tested positive we all felt unwell in the house, and all were confirmed positive by a postal PCR test and forced to quarantine for 10 days - three days longer than our eldest daughter who had bought home the plague!

On day 9 the school called to state that if we didn’t get her back to school on day 11 we would be reported to the Council and fined! I explained that we were all quarantined for a few more days because we had caught it from her, and she could only have caught it from school!

They insisted that we find a way to get our 7 year old to school anyway!

We managed to persuade a friend to walk past our house, call us from the end of the driveway so that she could walk her to school!

Needless to say, at the end of the academic year the children who had missed school because of Covid legal restrictions were excluded from an attendance awards even if that was the only absence they had… and that seemed unfair!

Absolutely not.

Thank goodness it isn't a thing in Scotland although it was in the 1930s when my dad was at school.

If people would just stop sending their obviously ill children to school my DS wouldn't miss the odd Thursday/Friday because he's picked up whatever lurgy the children sitting next to him on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday have. He would have perfect attendance. 🙄

@MeetMeOnTheCornernot sure I understand your post, but how will attendance awards incentivise a child with long covid who is too ill to go to school or incentivise a child with school refusal?

DC’s school has just sent out an email congratulating all the children with full attendance, mine is one of them. The children with health issues can just try a bit harder eh?
I’d also like to give an award to the child or teacher that doesn’t make half the class ill!
Teacher absence has increased by a similar percentage to that for children since pre-pandemic.

I simply do not understand why children need to be incentivised to go to school. I simply got up and went to school. When I had my children it was exactly the same, I got them up and they went to school unless they were ill or had medical appointments.

Also if a child vomits they are not allowed back in school for 48 hours, at least that’s how it is in our local authority.
Can you imagine when these children go out to work and turn up three weeks on the trot and they say to their boss where’s my goodie bag for showing up? Utter madness.

You’re all for punishing good kids whose attendance is usually great but who happened to get ill for one day during those three weeks and therefore missed out? Why? How is that fair? If those poor kids were forced to go whilst unwell then they would’ve made lots of other children ill and then they would’ve all missed out! Why is emotionally forcing unwell kids into a building with 2,000 other pupils something you’re “all for?”

It’s high school not primary

No, the 48 hour rule doesn’t apply in secondary schools

No but the school most have a severe truancy problem to reward kids for just three weeks attendance! I’d be laughing as my kids missed maybe one/two days a year!

It's a crap system ands when I was a school governor I opposed it very strongly.

Reward a child for kindness to others and trying hard, but not for something over which they have no control - illness, transport breakdown or parents not able to or willing to get them to school. In any event the child is not to blame.

If they cannot be blamed for not being there, they cannot be rewarded for being there.

It is all driven by the OfSted emphasis on attendance and I am sure that the staff have better things to do than police this.

I work in education and I despise attendance awards. Why are we training kids to show up even when they’re ill and possibly contagious which only leads to more ill children in school. Are we really saying that their presence is more important than the health of everyone around them.

The vast majority of parents do the best to get their children in to school everyday on time and those children get rewarded. A smaller number have genuine barriers that is preventing that - mental health issues/can’t afford the bus fayre/physical health issues/ etc etc and a much much smaller number just don’t see the value in having their children in school most days. The answer is to stop rewarding the first group and to work together with the seconds two groups to put things in place to help overcome the barriers and help them to understand why it’s beneficial for the child to be in school.

No good ever comes from parents feeling like school is butting heads with them instead of working with them.

I absolutely love this. Keep us updated 💀👀

No beacuse rewards are for things in people control

I understand why schools do it - they are so closely monitored on attendance that they are just doing anything they can to help. I don't know whether it actually does anything though. My kids have both had close to 100pc attendance throughout and have never won anything, despite being in for prize draws etc. So it is probably pointless!

I have also been in workplaces where similar incentives have been discussed (and dismissed). But I do know of one public sector organisation that gave this incentive if you had zero sicks days in a year. Not sure if they still do it though.