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

[JassyRadlett]

I really don't understand why so many people take it personally.

Because it’s a quasi-threatening letter addressed to them personally.

[onlyconnect]

But it's so obvious that it's a standard letter and shat the overall purpose of it is.

[LokiBear]

The letter clearly spells put to you that is a government requirement that they send the letter and how ridiculous the changes are. Don't be mad at the school, it is the government. Write to your MP.

[JassyRadlett]

But it's so obvious that it's a standard letter and shat the overall purpose of it is.

Excellent and appropriate typo.

The actual purpose seems to be ‘tick box for Ofsted’ as they can’t possibly be hoping to influence people’s behaviour with rubbish like that’s

[JassyRadlett]

Like that. Not that’s.

[DropItLikeASquat]

At our school there is a child going through chemo so its the rules that if a child is sick then its 48 hours off from the last vomit. we have sadly caught every bug going this winter including the flu despite us having flu jabs and nasal inoculations. on weds avo my daughter coughed and then gagged on her mucous. I had to collect her and now she can't go back for end of term because she has to be $* hours clear 'just in case. I have had one of these letter and if they say anything about it I will quote their 'policy' regarding this and not give it a second thought.

[LokiBear]

Our attendance officer hates her job. She hates it. She doesn't want to harass parents of genuinely poorly children. As a school, we do not want to prevent hardworking families from being able to afford a holiday once a year. We used to authorise up to 10 days for ks3 pupils because some parents just couldn't get holiday times off. We are not allowed to do this anymore. The government set the targets and flog us if we don't meet them.