To not be happy about this school attendance letter

[ByeGermsByeWorries]

Received this letter from my child's school.
DC(7) had 4 consecutive days off for a stomach bug, and a couple of afternoon medical appointments since August 2017.

There's no question about it, if my son is too ill to go to school he will not go to school. I don't keep him off for fun, I keep him off because he is ill.

Would your doctors surgery be happy to have their waiting room clogged up with children suffering from d&v or a temperature? How would you get a sick note for a child for something like this? There isn't really a prescription I can think of for the usual bugs we have going about, and I can't remember the last time I saw an appointment Card.

Some surgeries don't even offer same day appointments without urgent reasons. I'm worried about my son being ill at all this year now because they will set this "welfare officer" of theirs on me but I am neither happy nor willing to take up an appointment for something that has no cure other than fluids am rest, which somebody who is in actual need of a GP could use.

Should I respond or just pray for good health all year

My sons old school used to be like this, basically if they weren’t going in to the doctors then they had an unauthorised absence... absolutely ridiculous.

It's a generic letter, it's not personal.

You haven't done anything wrong and neither have the school.

You can relax.

So ridiculous. You tell the doctor your child had the runs and that’s what the letter will say - pretty sure the gp won’t ask for physical evidence? This and the removal of the 48 hour rule will put kids at risk, especially kids with existing illnesses or reduced immunity. I would be making a serious complaint about this - they may have to follow government guidelines, but these are not government guidelines.

Poor grammar, poor tone. And he GP thing is ridiculous and in the current climate frankly immoral.

The best way to achieve behaviour change is not to patronise or to alienate, curiously enough.

Given your followup posts, I’d write to the school setting out NHS policy on D&V and asking to see their medical risk assessment for the decision to remove the 48 hour rule as you feel it may have contributed to your child’s absence.

Just bin the letter and don't think any more about it. You're in no danger, you've done nothing wrong.

Those saying "it's just a generic letter" though - I do think as parents maybe there should be more organised and vociferous objections to this nonsense, as it does intimidate parents and I worry that ill children are sent to school because parents fear actionif they keep them off. The hysteria around attendance has got to stop. I remember at the pre-SATS meeting when ds1 was 10, his teacher telling us that even if the child had a fever or was ill, we should bring them in to sit the tests and then take them home afterwards. It's fucking ridiculous.

But it's NOT a generic letter really as all schools do not use the same wording.

They can monitor attendance all they like but they CAN'T ask for GP evidence.

I send one back (email) thanking them for their concern over X attendance. Reiterate illness was D and V for which there is an exclusion period which you adhered to. And that medical appointments are necessary for X illness/condition.

Then ask if you understand correctly that if your child has D and V that they will not mark this as an authorised absense and how they can justify this when with the 48 hour rule?

Reply along the lines of "Dear Head Teacher, get fucked".

The school is panicking. If they have to close for snow, that goes against their attendance stats.
But they are certainly not going to win friends and influence people like this.

It’s so badly written I’d consider changing schools if that’s the best they can do.

I was eye rolling my way through it, but the bold bit sent my blood pressure right up.

They can say everything the Government requires them to, without the side show of those fellows Patronising & Condescending.

I’d definitely write back. Absolutely.

Even when the way to the school was treacherous and thick with ice they did not close it. Just the playground. We don't currently have any snow and if we do it rarely settles so they don't have to worry about that

There's no joined-up thinking on all this nonsense imo. One govt dept is making schools send out snottygrams to parents with children who are unwell and insisting on some spurious medical evidence while another govt dept is asking people to stay home and self-treat for minor ailments. Jeremy Hunt needs to have a word with Damian Hinds so they can get a consistent position on this.

It's not even joined up within schools. They give them such a hard time if they come in with the wrong uniform that kids are so scared to go in with the wrong shoes or some other bit of kit and beg to stay home.

I know a single parent with mobility problems who struggles to get her 2 youngest to school on days when she can't manage with crutches and needs to use her wheelchair (taxi fare is £10 each way). There is no support for home-school transport for children of disabled parents, so she keeps getting threatened with prosecution. If the child was the one with the disability, they'd get home-school transport provided.

I totally get that attendance is important, but it's dealt with in such a heavy-handed way that schools often lose the goodwill of parents.

I am so,so glad to be out of the school system and their ridiculous attitude to attendance. I was lucky enough only to catch the beginning tail end of it in primary school,where someone pulled me aside and told me with a sad face that something or other would have to be put down as Unauthorized Absence. I was able to shrug and say do what you like,with no consequences. In senior school despite me ringing for every medical appointment my child had, they were sent on an anti truancy course (immediately retreated once I rang to complain).

When I read about parents being refused permission for attendance at close family or friends funerals, the poor woman who posted here about taking her family away during term time when one daughter was seriously mentally ill and the other was suffering because of it, and the head had no leeway to grant permission...well it makes me so angry. Headteachers need to have more trust put in them that they know the pupils and their family circumstances and OFSTED is a stupid waste of time and their targets are ruining education, not helping.

Lakie have a read of this "Disabled mum faces court over childs lateness to school"

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/im-dwarf-cant-go-any-11965500

We got a letter similar to this when DS attendance went below 90%. The reason it was so low is because he had one day off sick in the first two weeks of term. I filed the letter where it belonged in the bin

I had one similar to this after my son had a week off for a very bad virus, his attendance had dropped to 80% but then it was November so of cause it did. I was annoyed not by the fact I got a letter but the tone. My child is never late and has always had great attendance so I feel the tone of these letters should be changed. I spoke to the head because of the nature of the letter not the content and he agreed to look into the way it was worded, weather he will or not I don't know

Lakie it’s not the government insisting on medical evidence, it’s schools. IIRC the last set of government guidelines on attendance said that schools shouldn’t routinely be asking for them. Only if they suspect that children aren’t actually ill.

Ignore the letter. If he isn’t ill again, then the percentage will pick up, if he is just let them record it as unauthorised. It’s their look out if Ofsted start querying their unauthorised absence rate.

Another one who knows full well that a GP will NOT write sick note or letter for school. In fact I believe my GP friend has actually phoned/written to the schools concerned to let them know this - or requested a charge for a letter, which would be done after she'd got her never ending clinical work done. We really don't want vommy, virusy children clogging up the waiting rooms and passing their germs to the elderly, seriously ill and immunocompromised when they should be tucked up in bed and dosed on calpol.

I got one of these for my daughter following a prolonged period of illness ( 3 weeks on and off) .
I teach in the school she was attendjngat the time . The letters are generated automatically and the headteacher must be seen to send them out . Don’t take it personally, I read it, filed it and forgot about it .

there are threads like this regularly. I have recently found this helepful when I also received a letter. on the plus side mine has a lot lower attendance than yours as she has been very poorly.

BlackeyedSusan
Most schools apply a spot of common sense.
I had a student last year who I met maybe 2 dozen times iver the year due to serious ongoing medical issues. It was never an issue.

Ignore, it's a generic letter the school sends out automatically when absence hits a certain level. More common in schools with poor attendance rates & the main culprits won't give a flying one, whilst the parents who do care about attendance get stressed by it.

We had way too many of these, especially galling when your DC has chronic health problem made worse by bullying at the school

Or you could always really pee them off & if you receive one threatening you with the EWO, actually beat them to it & ring the EWO for advice yourself. That soon put a stop to the nonsense

Evidence = a pot of vomit/diarrhoea/ phlegm from now on! Please do it!!

I am a childminder and a parent once asked for proof I was ill for their employer. I asked if a pot of diarrhoea would do or just access to my full medical file at the hospital?

You're all talking as if every parent is responsible and as if it's really clear-cut, a child either must stay at home or must go to school.
Schools accept that genuinely ill children should stay off. What they want is for parents who indulge every sniffle with a day off to think twice about it.
Yes, it's a waste of GP time to give notes for trivial illnesses.
Yes schools need to impress on parents the need for as good attendance as possible. So many kids could attend better than they do. If you're not one of those just put the letter in the bin.
I really don't understand why so many people take it personally.

Well, I just got mine for DD2, in email form. Very different in tone from the one the OP receiver - no demands for GP letters, no assumption that the reason has been anything but illness, acknowledgement expressed that I let them know the reason DD was off.

So schools have to send these letters, but they have a choice about the wording and the form. Wht OP's school sent was not acceptable.

I think all schools know that this year the flu season is abominably bad. The way DD1 is going I expect to get a letter for her as well, and for the same reason.