Would we be unreasonable to take DCs out of school for a day for grandparents wedding anniversary?

[iwouldgoouttonight]

Grandparents are having a party for their golden wedding on a Saturday. They live about three hours drive away. They've asked if we can help them get things ready on the Friday, which would mean the DCS (9 and 7) taking a day off school.

They've already had one unauthorised day off for another reason in this academic year, and DS has missed a couple of hours here and there for hospital appointments.

Would you take them out on the Friday to go down to the grandparents?

Form, not firm obviously!

OP as someone who works in a school and manages attendance, I would advise your DH to ask for an authorised absence firm, fill it in honestly (travelling to family to help set up for a party), then when it isn't authorised you go anyway, knowing it will appear on their attendance record as an unauthorised absence. That way their teachers know they won't be in, you have followed school procedures and no one is being asked to lie.

I would explain to school that you are going away to grandparents' for the weekend. Does more than that need to be said?

I guess it depends on the school.
I've done exactly that at my DC's school, said 'We're going away for weekend, could we please collect DC after afternoon register?' The teacher said she would just check but should be okay and it was.

The school is 'covered' by the child being there for both registers so I don't think an exentuating situation needs to be detailed as the abscence is not actually formally recorded. That's my understanding, anyway.

Yes, I think schools are different. All requests for absence on our school have to be made to the HT on an authorised absence form. This enables us to keep track of absence as we're required to do by government and means teachers don't get drawn into issues that aren't in their remit to decide.

I definitely think saying you're going away for the weekend would be a good thing to write on the form. Doesn't mean it would be authorised though.

SuburbanRhonda so would the school you work at not allow the leaving after second register option? Just interested to know. I only have experience of one school.

We have to fill in a form for any absence just as you describe, but the point of leaving after second register is that no absence is actually recorded. The only people who would know the child had left the school would be class teacher and any other member of staff they had to verbally check it with.

Yes, children in our school can be taken out any time provided they are signed out. We encourage parents to make appts for the dentist optician and non-emergency GP outside of school hours. Hospital is different but most of our parents bring the hospital letter into school for us to copy and put in the child's file so we know they are going to be out.

So yes parents can take their child out straight after the afternoon register but we would record in the attendance comments what time the child was taken out.

I've just re-read your post, ovenchips - so are you saying that if a child leaves after the afternoon register in your school, it's not actually recorded anywhere that they are no longer on the premises?

I'm not saying school are cutting corners, I'm saying it is an informal arrangement.

My point is an absence request form doesn't need to be completed and authorised (or not) if a child leaves after the second register. That's why I suggested it as an option and presumably why others did so.

I know that if a child leaves after the afternoon register then it looks to all intents and purposes that they were there all afternoon when in fact they were absent. It's a good way to play the system but technically they've done nothing wrong.

What would concern me as one of our school's safeguarding officers is that a child was recorded as present and there was no written record of them having left the premises. It's not cutting corners it's a major safeguarding breach.

SuburbanRhonda I don't have any reason to be concerned about safeguarding. Anyway, seems a bit unnecessary to have to explain what they do, nor can imagine anyone else is interested.

What was supposed to be of interest is that the school allows children to leave after the second register on occasion. And that an absence request form is not needed for this. So it may be an option for OP.

I was asking if other schools did it purely out of interest.

Believe me, people are interested if a child is marked as present but is not in the building and there is no record of where they are. I can't believe you don't think that's a safeguarding issue!

Still, if that's what your school does its up to them I suppose. I've just never come across it before.

We're at cross purposes. You've made an assumption which you are taking as fact that as the absence is dealt with informally no record is made of the child not being on the school premises. It's quite a leap!

An absence after second register is not recorded as a formal absence (by that I mean used in school's absence data). My child's class teacher and the head of KS1 knew of the absence via a verbal request and gave verbal confirmation. I have every confidence all necessary changes were made by class teacher or head of KS1 to records of who was in the building that afternoon for safeguarding purposes particularly in case of fire. I didn't personally check this was documented because why would I? I don't check for the rest of the week either.

But the point is that the head did not have to be formally notified of my DC's absence that pm (she may well have known informally) nor was she involved in formally authorising (or not) the absence via the appropriate paperwork.

From others' suggestions on the thread this informal absence after second register happens in other schools. The whole point of it is that it isn't included as an absence in the data kept on this, so schools allow a little leeway - your child leaves early and their records are unaffected.

I apologise for long-winded thread derail about the perfectly boring behind the scenes stuff that happens in my DC's school that I am sure few have any interest in.

Actually not such a massive leap! When you posted upthread: The only people who would know the child had left the school would be class teacher and any other member of staff they had to verbally check it with. that did imply that the information was passed on verbally only. We ask our parents to let the office know as our teachers or senior leaders ate usually teaching and aren't responsible for updating absence figures - that's the job of office staff.

But clearly different schools operate different systems and actually think it is useful for others to know what happens in other schools.

If you are banging on about safeguarding suburban I'd have thought you'd have taken my point a bit more seriously. DD was marked absent when she was there. Had there been a fire and nobody had gone back for her due to a register error that would have been a massive safeguarding error. Ah, but schools make mistakes don't they

To avoid having to go into such long winded detail I said in two different posts it was nothing about cutting corners or ignoring safeguarding concerns. Isn't it easier to just accept another poster's word like that esp when it derails thread?

I think we've already ready discussed the situation that happened with your DD five years ago and I'm not aware I didn't take it seriously. I think I was the only poster who took the time to reply to your post so presumably everyone else took it even less seriously than I did, if that's possible

It was never was dealing with the women in the school office.

You did indeed say that on two separate posts. Not really sure what else there is to add?

I'm not sure there's really much derailing going on as no-one else is commenting atm.

Sorry, not sure I understand your post, beaufort

Get their afternoon registration marks and take them then. I work in a school - even when lessons are scheduled it's going to be something less vital, like PE. I think a Golden Wedding is special enough. Schools are under the government cosh to push up attendance

Enjoy the party

I would take them out of school for the day. But there doesn't seem to be half the fuss about kids missing the odd day of school on an unauthorised absence in Scotland so it's probably different if you live in England.

I wouldn't personally as it's not as if they'll miss the party just that you'll arrive Friday evening after school. And I wouldn't want to blemish my child's 100% attendance record.
If it was a case of missing the party I would have to re-think it, but it isn't.
The grandparents are being unreasonable to expect you to take your kids out of school when it really isn't necessary to do so.