How the fuck do you improve attendance

[Merryoldgoat]

I’ve had the delightful LA attendance officer letting me know my son’s attendance is 85%.

I KNOW. I’m the one looking after him.

How am I supposed to stop him getting ill? I’d love to know.

I’m just sick of it. We’re juggling two autistic children, a full time job and I get this officious letter implying I’m keeping him off under false pretences.

It’s such a stupid blunt instrument.

I’m angry and tired and just sick of it.

I have no AIBU. It’s just the rant of an exhausted parent. DH is also exhausted in case anyone is wondering.

But some parents keep children off for very minor illnesses when they should be in school.

Do you have a source for this info? Because honestly I hear this line trotted out time and again and I think it's absolute bollocks.
What parent seriously wants to keep their child off school if there's no need for it? I would think this type of scenario is very rare indeed.

Mostly get caught from school so best make sure they adhere to the same stringent rules.

I just tell them the truth if she's too poorly for school she stays home 🤷‍♀️and no amount of threats are going to make a sick child better!

The kitchens do and will be inspected to check they do.
Your child needs to wash their hands after going to the toilet in the school though and if they can before lunch.
It is not particularly stringent, just basic hygiene and does minimise vomiting bugs.

I think high levels of absence are understandable when there are chronic conditions involved - these may impact on immunity in any case.

For kids without underlying health conditions, though, surely it isn't "normal" for them to get so many bugs to the extent that they miss a day and a half of school each week, and the reason that their absence levels are being flagged up by the school is precisely because they are so far below the "norm".

I do of course accept that there is sometimes no explanation for persistent illness - doctors may not always be able to pinpoint why a child has low immunity, and it may therefore be very difficult to do anything practical to address it. I'm not saying that there are any magic wands, nor am I saying that it is the parent's fault etc. I'm sure that they don't want their kids to be ill!

I'm merely saying that a child being ill enough to miss significant amounts of school over an extended period is concerning, and warrants investigation to see if there are any underlying medical issues that need to be addressed or if there are any other issues that might be impacting on the child's attendance. I don't see why that is so controversial?

@cornflakegeneration It is what I personally see. Do you really think parents whose kids have higher attendance are always well? They are not. We just send them in and only keep them off when they are really ill.

My DC's schools approach is "bring them in sick and we will call you to collect them if we feel they're too sick"

Erm, how's about let their own mum do the judging on the sick front?

Are there sanctions for poor attendance or is help/information offered. I used to work as a TA and I got cheesed off with dealing with obviously unwell children who should have been kept at home. Bugs and colds etc would spread like wildfire affecting both children and adults.

Hmm, I think I'd be quite unhappy if my GP was so dismissive. Personally, I would want to know why my child's immunity was so much lower than the norm

He wasn't dismissive. He was reassuring me that there was nothing wrong with my child and that a certain percentage of children are more susceptible to catching things. There's nothing wrong with my child's immune system. In fact GP commented that he has a good immune system as he fights things off. He also commented that he was fed up with parents coming in and asking for this reassurance regarding school attendance as what the children needed to get better was to be at home resting.

FWIW, I do think the system is failing if standard letters are sent out to parents of children with known medical issues, such as the child receiving cancer treatment mentioned by a previous poster. Where the reasons for the absence are abundantly clear, it should be possible to put a flag on the system to prevent automated letters from being sent out. However, I can't object to letters being sent to families where attendance is very low and there is no obvious explanation for this.

Same here. We had one of these letters yesterday. She was sent home last week with a temp. Off for 2 days.

Last night complained of tummy ache at about 3am but wasn’t sick so this morning gave her breakfast, costume on, took her to school. She was crying and I felt so guilty taking her, I spoke with the teacher and said she’s very tired/was up in the night. But had eaten etc.

Half an hour later feeling guilty I got my phone out to call the school and see if she was ok. My phone started ringing - it was the school. She was violently sick in class! Poor baby. I felt so guilty :( she was really shaken. She’s only in reception and still doesn’t know how to describe that feeling of nausea yet.

So now she won’t be back until Monday. She eats healthily, take vitamins every day, I make us homemade healthy soups etc. I really don’t know what I can do to help her immune system.

Bugs in the home help build immune systems. If I think of some of the cooking practices from my mum - huge pot of chicken soup (to feed a family of 7) made before the weekend and left on the hob to get cold/reheated for several days until all used up! Chicken thoroughly washed splashing all around he sink. The same cloths used for wiping down surfaces and drying dishes for days.

I am not quite that bad, but still miles away from my clean obsessive SIL. ds was very rarely ill, my sil's dd was off regularly with just bug after bug.

It is down to genes, viruses!

The kitchens do and will be inspected to check they do.
Your child needs to wash their hands after going to the toilet in the school though and if they can before lunch.
It is not particularly stringent, just basic hygiene and does minimise vomiting bugs.

Kids don't have very long for lunch and in primary school they rush to wash their hands so probably don't do it properly. They are all breathing all over each other, touching each others hands and belongings - no amount of kitchen inspections are going to prevent norovirus spreading through a bunch of primary kids.

I question this "they have to send the letter" philosophy. Ds2's attendance is running at around 70% currently- he's been in and out of hospital since September. I've heard nothing from the attendance officer and had nothing from his school but support. Maybe because doctors are involved, or because he's clearly seriously ill but no one is (thankfully) trying to make our lives any harder.

Unfortunately though, what you "personally see" is not representative of the wider population.

Also my DD was very rarely off sick from preschool, it’s definitely been since she’s been in school. Both my daughters just seem
to be bringing home illnesses every week I
am so drained by it. Feels like months of at least one person being off colour.

Hope your ds is ok and on the road to recovery? And thank goodness you have one less worry not having to justify non attendance.

I think you’re right - they do have some choice. We got threatened with court for illness! I pointed out they can’t actually refer to the LA for illness and I then got proof it was genuine Illness but the fact they knew that court wasn’t even an option but threatened us with it has really damaged the relationship

I think the answer is to not be bothered about the letter home, and to see your child as more than the Statistic that the school register does.
Look at his health holistically - is he getting a good balance of indoor and outdoor, is he happy, has he got friendships, can he pursue his interests, how is his diet, can you add in a multi vit, some vit d and maybe some probiotics?
I know all of these things are huge challenges with neurodiverse kids, but focusing on doing it for HIM rather than to meet the needs of school attendance statistics might help his internal motivators.

It's so important that kids that have lower immune systems, and need more down time actually get it- otherwise the result will be a child with 98% school attendance and really bad mental health... and we all know that is a problem that's really hard to treat.

I totally feel you OP. My teen has 90% attendance and I got a letter. Every single absence was either due to a medical appointment (letter / email evidence provided each time) or the rang me to say she needs to come home as she’s sick so I had to collect her.
got a letter telling me to make her attendance better. I mean WTF. Made me feel shit and angry.
Doesn’t seem to be anyone human actually checking the reasons for absence.

We were in the same boat. During the first month of term, DS caught all the bugs and his lower than normal attendance was a mixture of several not-always-consecutive days where he couldn't go into school. Even the school had sent him home more than once! It was annoying to get the letter, since the school knows why he was off and we did involve the doctor to see if anything could be done.

I don't really care about other people's opinions on 'oh that does sound like a lot of absence'... actually he hasn't been off for a single day since the first week in October. We just had a unlucky first month.

I have no qualms with the school, we love it and the teachers are lovely. I would prefer they would not waste paper and time to send letter that will only get ignored, but it's a letter they have to send on behalf of the gov. My husband wrote to the school and the head said the school will be changing some of the wording they send to parents like us: the change will be around the wording that insinuates we are doing a disservice to our kids by keeping them off for the days stated.

DS is at the same attendance level, also with ASD. He’s not home for sniffles and coughs, he’s home because he has croup so severe he’s on steroids, because he’s vomiting so forcefully and frequently he’s on rehydrating medication, because he’s got tonsillitis with a temp high enough to require hospital admission. All evidence supplied to the school but I received the same letter about his attendance. Spoke to the school about it who said continue what I’m doing, the letters need sent but they aren’t disputing his illnesses nor the frequency of them and I’m fine to carry on as is.

There is nothing you can do to improve his attendance except highlight to the school that he has ASD and with that comes a multitude of health issues and a lower immune system and if they want to discriminate against him and his health conditions then you’ll be happy to take legal advice. They’ll back off sharpish.

Lack of handwashing and ventilation is a problem that I see.

Every time one of these threads pops up, there are always the same comments:

"That's a lot of time off"
"That's x days off a week/month"
"That's not normal"
"Low attendance has a direct correlation with success/career when older"

To put it bluntly I don't give a fuck about statistics. My child is not a statistic. He is a human being who needs to be nurtured and helped to rest and feel better, not marched into school crying and doped up on nurofen only to be sent home again. Personally I question the morals of parents who do this.

I would just let it wash over you. They have to send the same standard letter whether the low attendance is truanting, long term sickness, anxiety or any kind of issue. Schools are measured on attendance which is why they have to in turn chase up parents.

Surely illness is an authorised absence unless they have suspicion it's not genuine, so you can ask them what reasonable evidence they need for their records, given that you are not meant to go to GP for things that just need OTC meds or rest.

Write down the symptoms and say you want to clarify if a child should be in school with noticeable fever, sobbing with pain clutching a hot water bottle, severe headache, dizzy and fainting, constant severe cough, vomiting etc. Make them say no.

Obviously a child who misses school might see an impact on their attainment compared to if they had 100%, but if they have unavoidable health issues, they are already doing the best they can.