Unauthorised absences wtf are we supposed to do!

[dreamingbohemian]

Surely everyone knows that it's nearly impossible to get GP appointments these days. And surely everyone understands that sometimes your DC are too unwell to go to school but not unwell enough to get an emergency appointment.

But my DC's school are now saying any absence that doesn't have medical evidence will be unauthorised. They will only accept things you can get from a GP, like an appointment card or prescription.

So what are we meant to do??? We are finishing the year being this close to persistent absence, which doesn't seem fair. We can't help it if DC was ill a lot this year, but with routine bugs that a GP would never see him for or prescribe anything (including norovirus -- are we meant to send him in and spread it then?)

AIBU to think this makes no sense?

(not school bashing here, they say they are just following policy)

I'm really appreciating all this good advice (even case law!) thank you all so much! I feel much better equipped to deal with this and will be looking into things more.

Also sad to see your experiences @TopGunMaverick @Gerrataere @Verbena17 @AnotherPidgey that is really awful. How can schools be doing this? It sounds like not all schools are like this so it can't just be a matter of the policy, can it.

If you wanted to take it further you could always request your child's attendance records. Under GDPR these have to be ACCURATE - a school recording an absence as unauthorised (when the legislation cannot insist that evidence is provided regarding gp appt etc) is waaaay beyond GDPR and can be in trouble for inaccurate record-keeping, itself a safeguarding issue, especially if there is no subsequent investigation by the safeguarding team/referral to ss etc. They can't just slap you with unauthorised absence without following their own procedures which would be a massive ballache when they do know that the child is too poorly for school but not for a gp appt.

How many days off sick has he had?

Sounds like my daughter’s school.
my daughter has cerebral palsy and epilepsy. When she has a nocturnal seizure she’s usually bedridden for a few days with an inability to walk.
yet they still want proof and still push me to send her in and say theyll call and ask her to be collected if they deem her too unwell.
ignoring the fact she takes a taxi to school with carer as it’s 30 miles away.
as if I’m going to send my physically disabled child in to school 30 miles away when she’s just had a horrific grand mal seizure and can barely move her mouth let alone her legs.
it’s disgusting in my opinion.

In fairness though, if you have good reason here to can be off school without scrutiny. My son has been going through Leukaemia treatment for 2 years, his school attendance must be 20% at best. He just turns up as and when he can. I understand it's the same for kids with SEN. It might depend on the school how serious they are about it though.

I had this recently with my 15 year old.
He's a hardy kid who if he has a cold, to him it's a sniffle and he will have a warm drink later.
From September he had a half day for a funeral, Covid a few days before they broke up for Christmas, Quinsy in February and was of for 5 days, was on penicillin for it and tonsillitis last month, he persisted through it and went to school for a week until it became infected and had to have more penicillin and instructed to have the rest of that week off which was 4 days. I had a threat from school that his attendance was two low and I needed a note from the doctor and he had to have 100% attendance for the next 6 weeks or they would take legal action. They ended up emailing after 6 weeks asking if I ever needed help getting my son to school these are the people to contact.
We did get a note from the doctor but they told us under no circumstances were the school allowed to keep or make a copy of the note due to it having my sons medical history on it. They could read it that's it. Them keeping it would be a breach of GDPR and we could take legal action against them! I told this school this and they had no idea they weren't allowed to keep doctors notes on file.
Thankfully my son hasn't been ill since but I will have no issue putting them in their place again when they start hassling me for proof.

Having sen makes no difference. The law doesn’t make allowances for children with disability. The only allowances they have to make are reasonable adjustments ie making school trips attainable and not excluding them from activities.

It's a very good idea. Children in abusive homes are often kept there under a fictitious long term illness.

It's a pointless idea when you're talking about short (a day or two) illnesses as OP seems to be. GPs won't see a child for that, therefore there's no point asking for evidence a GP was seen. If I called my GP surgery and said "my child has woken up with a fever and feels unwell" there is no way I'd get an appointment. And quite right too, unless there are underlying conditions, or other more worrying symptoms, GPs have better things to do!

No not all schools are like this at all. My other son is at mainstream but has severe additional needs. His attendance for the year looks atrocious on paper, but he was on a very limited timetable to start with and still finishes early (though is at both registers for the day). Mixed in with illness and occasionally other difficulties, it would be easy for the council to send a letter asking wtf. Funnily enough it never happened, despite the other school telling me that it’s out of their hands and ‘automatically sent when a child’s attendance drops below a certain %’.

I think the only time I've seen a school be completely relaxed about attendance is when it's something like cancer. Even the SEN kids get attendance issues which is bizarre as the NHS doesn't exactly give you a free choice of appointment times.

Sorry I should add they’re at different schools, because like hell I was sending my kid with even more needs to a school that’s treated my first SEN kid so badly at times.

Wow I'm so sorry to hear some of these experiences it's absolutely mad, kids just get sick sometimes! Not sick enough to clog up NHS services by going to the doctor but too sick to be fit for school. I don't get how anyone can work professionally with children and think needed doctor authorisation for every single child and every single absence is proportionate action.

Under the current official guidance - https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1099677/Working_together_to_improve_school_attendance.pdf - it says:

"In the majority of cases a parent’s notification that their child is ill can be accepted without question or concern. Schools should not routinely request that parents provide medical evidence to support illness. Schools are advised not to request medical evidence unnecessarily as it places additional pressure on health professionals, their staff and their appointments system particularly if the illness is one that does not require treatment by a health professional. Only where the school has a genuine and reasonable doubt about the authenticity of the illness should medical evidence be requested to support the absence."

Ask the school whether they have a genuine and reasonable doubt about the authenticity of your child's illnesses, and if so what is the basis for that. Simply being at or around 90% attendance isn't enough to justify that.

Some schools have a policy that after a child has had a sickness bug or diarrhoea they can’t attend school for 48 hr. Others say a 24hr policy! This adds days to a child’s attendance.

I had this conversation with school just yesterday! Dd has ongoing chronic health problems, which school know about. Makes no difference. I've had 2 telephone appointments with the gp this week. School want me to ask the gp to type up a summary of the phone calls!! We have a face to face gp apt on Monday and I said I would ask then, but apparently it can't wait till then. I told them to leave it as unauthorised, like I give a fuck when I'm trying to manage dd's deteriorating health on top of everything else in our lives.

It's a good idea that schools pass on any concerns about children to the relevant authorities. It's not good that any parents are fined- even the most feckless ones, as this doesn't help children. Loads of parents are fined every year when their children are genuinely mentally or physically ill and children get to miss parties and special events due to punishing them for low attendance. It's not good that already busy/unavailable NHS resources are being requested further unnecessarily by schools.

We’ve had calls and the threatening letter - DC had been off with scarlet fever (letter went out from the school at the time asking parents to watch for it and asking for kids not to be in school with any symptoms) and Covid.

The claims that schools are following Council “rules” mean that the councils are not following the published Gov guidelines. I suspect the schools all know this contradiction but continue to hassle parents because of the pressure from Ofsted for attendance figures no matter what.

As for rewards for good attendance - don’t get me started! Discriminatory bollocks and there is way too much focus on them. You can’t say “Don’t be ill!”

Oh yes, it was in the fore-mentioned shitty council letter I got. I was told that I must make sure any appointments my child fall outside school hours. Anyone with a SEN child knows that appointments with specialists are like hens teeth and I specifically replied that I would make absolutely no effort to rearrange my son’s paediatric appointments to suit the school or anyone else. Because if he starts loosing what little pathway we’re on then eventually everything in school will become a no-go.

Based on?

We had similar. I rang the school pastoral support and chatted it through. They know that if parents are on side then there is not a lot they can do. We have an attendance of 93% which is due to unfortunate illness, type 1 diabetes, 2 days of unauthorised absence due to a family holiday prior to the Easter holidays (which I did not lie to the school about) and 1 day of school refusal whereby I gave what I deemed a "mental health day" where I dragged his arse over the moors for an exceptionally long hike. I was up front about all these things with the welfare lead at the school and she was very supportive. Have you spoken to the welfare/pastoral team at school?

Ok that is super interesting. Didn't think of GDPR!

I don't see how they could legally fine you for not providing evidence that it's literally impossible to get. How would that be legal?

This, it just affects the school's standing with Ofsted (I think). It doesn't affect your child.

You won't be fined for sickness. Councils are only interested in serious persistent absence or term-time holidays.

And schools need to stop this nonsense about needing proof from a GP - it's well known that you can't get an appointment with a GP and why on earth would you even try for a minor bug which means you are too unwell for school.

His attendance is 92% this year. Which is bad, I know, but these things happen.

I was expecting you to say 80%. That's an absolutely massive overreaction from the school.

You’re missing the point spectacularly