To keep her off again? Will something happen?

[tabbysarerude]

My child has had 4 absences, the AM and PM count as one each. I kept her off when she was coughing in the night. And last night she's been sick and said her tummy felt bad.

Do I force her in or keep her off? The head mentioned something about if they don't get 98% attendance it triggers the law? Not sure what she meant but I'd rather force her into school feeling unwell than have some type of fine.

*My dd has a nasty chest infection and has been off school since Friday.

We saw the GP last night and she was asking him if she could go back to school tomorrow - she’s terrified of her attendance going down and “letting down the class”. Our GP is lovely and gently told her that she needs to be in bed until her temperature is under control and her medicine is working and not to worry about school.

Shes in year 4 and this is the most unwell she’s been in her life and she’s sitting down working out attendance percentages and worrying what her percentage will be on the end of term letter.

All her school go on about is attendance, we get weekly emails, they get golden time in class for it. If they are too sick to be in school it makes them feel awful, such a guilt trip.*

It's goddamn ridiculous that a yr 4 child (or any age to be honest) is stressing about this when she should be tucked up in bed resting with not a care in the world. The pressure on children is insane.

I have also had a nurse practitioner tell me, when I asked when my child could go back to school, that she was fed up of parents asking her to write letters to school etc because they were worried about attendance.

There is a big sign up in our surgery saying that the drs will not write notes for school attendance.

I reported dds third day of sickness on parentmail this morning, saying that she had seen a Gp last night and had medication prescribed and was still quite unwell, and GP advice was to stay at home while temperature was still spiking.

They asked for proof of illness so I sent them a screenshot of the appointment text and a photo of the medication with her name sticker on. Not much else I can do but that!

@santasbushybeard
I honestly think it's absurd that on DAY 3 of an illness they are asking for medical evidence for a CHILD. Surely anyone with any sense can see that is ludicrous. Who made up these ridiculous rules? Even in most workplaces they let you self certify for a week. If I were you I would have sent them a picture of the sign at the doctors.

Ha, yes, I should have done!

The school has a very low attendance over all. We live in a deprived area and to be honest, there are people who just can’t be arsed to
send children into school.
They got a super duper “turn around” head in 18 months ago and attendance is his main issue.

Pissed me off though as dd has had, on average, one day per school year off for illness infect, she didn’t have a single day off in year 3.

I would understand asking for proof if she had low attendance.

Our secondary school keep on with the message that it's OK to be in school when they are poorly. To the point they've told us not to test the kids if they've got covid symptoms. Also when ds was poorly they called me at lunchtime to see if he could manage going in that afternoon! He has only had 1 day off and on tutor night we were grilled!

@Mummyto3ginismyfriend I'm sorry your school have got their priorities so wrong. Telling parents not to test for COVID is ridiculous, there are many reasons it's useful to know if it's covid or not.

Incidentally this is a great article by 3 Canadian doctors analysing why so many children are so sick this winter, based on the Canadian context which is much the same as the UK. Definitely worth a read:
calgaryherald.com/opinion/columnists/opinion-we-dont-know-whats-causing-the-tsunami-of-sick-kids-but-wed-better-figure-it-out-fast