100% attendance certificates at DS's school, aibu?

[BoobleBeep]

DS's school has just announced they will be giving out certificates to children with 100% attendance in an assembly at the end of term..... This basically excludes any child who has been ill at any point throught the year, needed dental treatment or has parents who can't afford to take them away during expensive term time. Aibu to be a bit pissed off about this?

To clarify:

my ds who is bone idle but until recently in good health always thought he was doing well because he got certificates and praise while the school was always treating his sister (hardworking but in poor health) as a problem child

this meant he never really got the point of actually working hard or being attentive at school, since no awards were ever given out for that

so he now has really sloppy work habits

he was also later diagnosed with the same medical condition as dd

this terrified him as he thought his attendance might drop and that the school would then be angry with him and think he had let them down

they are both now at secondary school where dd is suddenly finding that teachers appreciate her hard work- and that her predictions for GCSE are very encouraging

ds otoh, the lad with the 100% attendance record, is going to have to do a lot of catching up to do

Staff at my school get them too! At the end of the academic year, we have an all staff assembly where 100%ers get their prize. They're named after the deputy head who awards them each year. The students know about them, and like winding the staff up who haven't received them. Also, 100% attendee staff get an Easter Egg! The students are also rewarded with increments of attendance (ie 95% - 98%, 99% and 100% - various rewards, house points etc. It just sets the importance of attendance. The other students don't get penalised, and it is mildly unfortunate for those students where it is beyond their control, but it's more to remind/advise parents who sometimes don't appreciate the importance of attendance to think twice if they are planning to pull the kids out of school for an avoidable reason.
This is at secondary level, so maybe the primaries are just preparing the students for the transition in culture?

Secondary is different though, as students have a great deal more input into whether or not they attend school.

Not always, tethers...we have some very mouthy parents. But I appreciate that there is a massive difference. I just wondered if it was to do with preparation for secondary learning, as more clusters of schools are doing the joined-up service and some primaries may share a policy with the secondary.
It does seem a shame for the little ones who have only had 1 day off, or the like.

Funnily enough I find dcs's secondary is far more supportive of pupils who for some reason are unable achieve 100% attendance; they have never made dd feel bad in any way and she is always given full information on how to catch up. They are just so much more clued up.

Her junior school just told the children en masse that if you miss x % if lessons you will fail your GSCEs and ruin your chances in life; her secondary are all about finding ways around and over your difficulties and dealing with challenges. I love them!

A little of that support at junior school, when she was young enough to believe in everything the teachers said, would have saved years of expensive NHS counselling.

My stupid phone missed out three pages of this thread, and now I've read them, my post seems redundant. Sorry if i've repeated any earlier points that have already been debated! Gah!

Ah... our deputy pays for it out of his own pocket... but last year, out of a staff of 160, we had over half on full attendance. Doubtful it had much to do with certificates, of course, but still pretty good! :)

i like them, my sons get then all the time

I've never won one in my 6 years on staff, but i can't say i'm gutted by that. Just a bit of fun...:)

Christ almighty - I love this forum I do .....talk about making every one equal ... and but lets not forget to over look children who do make quotas ..... hey!" lets NOT reward a child thats turned up very day ..... but you know they are supposed to turn up everyday ...so I suggest a 1/2 hour detention as a penalisation for every day off instead. Would that be better?

8 years of school and my youngest has just had his first day off. I am so mardy his attendance is broken.

I don't want to make everybody equal: I want awards to be for either achievement or effort- not for being brought into school on time by mummy and for never falling ill. You might as well start handing out awards for having the prettiest hair or being the tallest. Yes, it would be nice for the children whose only chance of ever getting an award is the tallest child in the class award- but is it meaningful?

I feel no pride in ds' 100% attendance- but the day he pulls himself together and does some work that goes beyond the bare essentials I shall be bursting with pride.

I think if parents were rewarded for their child's good attendance in the same way that they are fined for their child's poor attendance, it would make more sense. I think some parents would love it.

My DS2 will never get the attendance certificate because each year he has to attend 2 appts at Barts & 2 Chelsea & Westminster. No matter how hard I try to schedule these for sch holidays chances are we'll get a letter saying they've been moved.

No, Sardine. Really what I am saying is not that I am the sort of person the certificates work for. I don 't care about them. The OP asked if she was being unreasonable to object to them because some children won't ever get one. I believe it is okay to be pleased for people who achieve things, or are given things, even when there is no chance of achieving the same things oneself. My youngest got quite a few of the things, he was quite pleased, and that was nice for him, but not a big deal. I expected my children to go to school, unless they had a very good reason not to. My eldest had to use a nebuliser four times a day, and attend various clinics for quite a few years, so his attendance was slightly affected. And at the upper end of primary school, I am pretty sure at least one of them wangled a day or two off when, in hindsight, I wondered if they coulld not have perhaps gone in after all. But please feel free to continue telling me what I am really saying. At the end of it all, I don't actually care about the certificates. We don't make a massive deal about them in my school, and personally I give the children in my class all sorts of rewards for stuff they have complete control over, and my grown up children are fabulous. So there.

At our school we also celebrate improved attendance,i.e. those in families who have been contacted by the attendance officer for low attendance. They may not get 100 per cent,maybe only 95, but it is an acheivement for them when they might only have got 70 per cent before.

LOL at 'sickly kids' recognising their condition.

DS was so determined to get back to his school, to join in, to be 'normal', that he went in the first day he came back from hospital having had a cut made all the way through his tibia and held together with pins - all extremely painful.

Despite such determination and grit, he was denied any certificates even when his only absence was down to hospital treatment.

He then used his elected position in the school council to argue that absences due solely to permanent / long term disability and illlness should not count against attendance certificates.

However, he also has a wider, broader view, and knows such awards to be pretty worthless if based on luck: did you catch a bug or not? -

My son's school does this. One year the only one given out was given to a boy who had started at the school in January of that year so hadn't actually done a full year. It was really funny how many Mums were cross about it and the children didn't give a toss :)

Bit late I know but I found this thread after talking to a friend this morning, at our childrens school they have prizes for attendance, they have a smaller prize if they have 100% for a half term and a larger prize for a full term. Her daughter had a hospital appointment and missed out on getting a prize and she thought this was unfair. I agree that it is slightly unfair on children who can not attend school for unavoidable reasons but the schools do need to do something to get attendance figures up, our are is particularly bad for attendance and punctuality. People have said why not reward children for something they can control like their Maths or spelling, but, a dyslexic child will never get good spelling marks, a child in a wheel chair will never come first in a running race, a child who just doesnt understand Maths will never get their sums right. I have had my daughter come home and tell me that a boy has received a prize for completing his star chart when I asked her if she had one she said 'no he does because he is naughty' all children have their strengths and I think most even young ones understand they are not all the same. My other child is two and in playgroup. She wears glasses and gets a sticker for keeping them on each day, would it be silly for parents to complain that my child gets a sticker when their glasses free child doesn't? I am sorry for the children who will never get 100% attendance but there are others who will never achieve a lot of the other things that schools often reward as well. No child is perfect but they all have to be praised for what they individually achieve.

At my dc's school they get certificates every term and then at the end of the year the children that have not had any time off get taken out. They have been to kidspace before and to the cinema at The O2, i think it's a bit unfair on children who have hospital or dental appointments.