Headteachers should drive to the homes of absent pupils and get them into school

[Amuseaboosh]

Headteachers "have a duty" to drive to the homes of absent pupils and bring them into school, the education secretary has said.

Gillian Keegan said levels of absence in schools were now "a crisis," with recent figures revealing that 125,000 pupils spent more time out of class than in.

I know how very lucky I am to have never had to cope with any of my children not wanting to go to school.
However, I'm not so ignorant that I believe that all the parents dealing with this issue haven't tried absolutely everything to get their child into school. Where is ANY member of teaching staff supposed to find the time to attend to 125,000 pupils in person to get them to come to school?

AIBU in thinking Gillian is out of touch and ignorant? Or can someone see wisdom here that I cannot?

Hows about making school a pleasant and interesting place to be in, where girls aren't risking being rapor sexually harassed in the toilets, and kids aren't being lied to, and behaviour management is rewarded not punished and the teachers are given the tools to actually teach facts not fiction?

It's a start Gillian. I wouldn't be going to school to be confronted with that shitshow either.

DD has CHD and was often ill. She still maintained an attendance of over 90%. One morning I forgot to call in and they turned up just as we were leaving for school around 10.30am. She'd had a heart stress test at the hospital so had to come home to change.

When I was doing my PGCE I work shadowed an Education Welfare Officer for a week. This was their job. Don't they exist any more? Has Keegan not heard of these people?

Ds school refused for months. School acceded is of not trying, the EWO literally hissed at us in a meeting to “just get him in”. At the time we couldn’t get near him. If we entered his room he attacked us.
School threatened to fine us, take us to court etc.
Not once did they stop and try to meet his needs.

Education has become a farce. More children than ever are having mental health crises. Schools/the government keep piling the pressure on to already stressed out children. I support teacher strikes, but if teachers decided to strike to change the system for the benefit of the children’s well-being I’d be there on the picket line handing out cakes and tea!

More and more people are home educating. If the HE groups on FB are anything to go by, more teachers are home educating because they don’t want their children learning in that environment.

In contrast my youngest is in a school with does their utmost to meet his needs and make sure he’s comfortable in school - sensory issues with school clothes? Wear tracksuit bottoms. Can’t cope with all the lessons? Do your work with the pastoral care team. DS’s attendance is 90% so not amazing, but it feels miraculous, and is all down to school’s willingness to make every reasonable adjustment they possibly can. Older DS’s school didn’t acknowledge his disability at all and set him up to fail.

Children do well if they can.

*School accused us

This government shut schools for months and gave the impression that in person schooling didn't matter. And now they appear to be astonished by the entirely predictable results.

As if Headteachers don't have enough to do.

I had a ”school refuser” and used to force her into the car in the mornings and peel her off me, while she was still crying, to make her go in with a staff member.

School said “

Academically capable, just anxious/she is trying to control you/be firm/she is fine when you are gone etc”

She then had a sudden and severe mental breakdown. At 8 years old. I didn’t think we were going to come back from it and she seemed to have psychosis at points. She couldn’t go to school.

School - their attitude towards me was disgusting. More advice that I needed to be firm, “she has to come in”. Muttering about unauthorised attendance.

Luckily DD was fast tracked to CAMHS and they did NOT agree with the “force her in” approach. There is lots of evidence that this causes trauma and makes school fear and avoidance worse.

DD recovered when out of school. She was then diagnosed with autism and some specific learning difficulties, and eventually things started to make sense.

In that early period, I had no support from school as they were so so focused on attendance and just didn’t want to see or believed what DD was going through and what was happening for us as a family. Luckily we were able to pay for professional support and some legal advice, and they backed right down, eventually.

Lots of families do not have that though. And a LOT of autistic DC are out of school. I’ve met so many families with such similar stories, having to fight school and local authorities to get suitable and safe education for their DC, while unable to work as their DC aren’t in education.

The last things these families need is more blame !

The thought of a headteacher coming to our home, to DD’s safe space to tell her to come to school, I can only imagine that impact that would have had 😔

Oh good. The headteacher can get kicked instead of the parent. Of course then the pupil will be excluded & be off school anyway. Bit pointless really.

This is the classic mistake of jumping to solution (an unworkable and likely ineffective, costly and inefficient solution) without first understanding ‘why’. Why has absence increased?

I work with children and young people in a professional capacity and have for 30 years, and the answer to that question is complex.

The reasons why absence starts to increase and what then maintains and exacerbates it are multiple and complex and involve all layers of the system; within child factors, parent factors, family system factors, teacher factors, school factors and wider societal factors.

I’d have thought a HT would be putting themselves at unnecessary risk doing this. Most of these absentee children will be at a certain kind of household where a teacher turning up (probably alone because resource!) will be subject to a torrent of verbal abuse at best.

That said there needs to be mechanisms for checking up on kids who haven’t turned up for safeguarding reasons. Especially at primary. I worked at a school where there was a rapid escalation route to the police following an incident where a child was found alone with the bodies of their parents who had ODd at night.

interesting how they’re all of a sudden keen on kids being in school after stopping them for 2 years for lockdowns.

Lockdown caused my daughter to develop severe separation anxiety, and she struggles going into school now. You reap what you sow. They don’t have a leg to stand on after party gate.

Headteachers have more than enough to deal with without this. And they could try improving mental health assistance for both adults and kids, which would help to solve the problem but they’re all pretending the lockdowns had no effect so they won’t bother.

that might take all day!

I’d have thought a HT would be putting themselves at unnecessary risk doing this. Most of these absentee children will be at a certain kind of household where a teacher turning up (probably alone because resource!) will be subject to a torrent of verbal abuse at best.

What a judgemental and ignorant comment!
“Certain type of household”? ODFOD.

There isn’t a thing she says that’s of value. She’s a blind Tory stooge who does as she’s told.

This already happens in many schools.

I am so sorry you went through that.

Thank you for sharing your story though, that just triggered a lot of unexpected tears for me (in a good way, I think!) when I read your ending, as it actually gave me hope that my DD will eventually succeed and will recover from what the school environment did to her.

Most of these absentee children will be at a certain kind of household where a teacher turning up (probably alone because resource!) will be subject to a torrent of verbal abuse at best.

Good grief have you not read the posts on this thread?

Many many households with school refusing children are not like this at all.

Stop being so ignorant.

Perhaps if parents didn’t have to fight so long fighting for diagnosis and support for children then less would struggle with school attendance.

perhaps if schools had proper funding to support pupils with the right measures for the individuals there would be less issues.

if EHCPs where proper written and the support in them provided there would be less issues.

if we had more alternative provisions available there would be less issues

if schools listened to the families instead of judging there would be less issues.

Is it the job of the school though? I am Irish so possibly a different system but if absences here are over 20 days in a school year they are referred to the Education welfare officers who deal with it.

most of these absentee children will be in a certain kind of household Well that shows how little you know. Much more complicated than that.

Quite!

Friend's son hasn't been to school for nearly 6 years.

He's been waiting for a CAMHS assessment for 6.5 years. Finally got a date for September, having been moved up a tier after a massive intervention by a very supportive GP.

@Jujubes5 and @Gateappreciation it's not about making it fun or not fun, or choosing whether to come to school. It's not a choice the child is making in many cases. My DD was bored rigid at home, hated it, desperately wanted to go in and be in class, be with her friends, but literally couldn't get out the car. School were hopeless, absolutely did not get it and said she was being rude and naughty. Their EOW came out..totally pointless as I knew if would be. Her counselor that I was paying £40 a session for met us at school one morning to try, no luck.
I had no idea how paralyzingly terrifying it is to be in this situation. I work, I was missing work, cutting corners, risking my job. To be fair CAHMS "early help" did contact me but by then I had taken the decision to put her in a private school (which I know is not an option for all and frankly is not really affordable for me but I'll take on debt as she needs it). They allowed her so much more flexibility for a period of time until she healed and is now thriving. I had no idea the depth of EBSA and having to try and persuade school, family and ex that she was ill, not choosing this, was awful. Turning off the WiFi, making being at home a "punishment" is not the answer.

A teacher dropped by to check up on my autistic daughter, then 8, who had school refused that day.

The teacher got a half committal grunt from my daughter’s position under her desk with her blankets and fairy lights on. They took my word from then about school refusal days and just call part way through the day now to check in!

One of our teachers did this when a friend of mine didn't turn up for an exam. She had missed that much school the education authority refused to pay for her to take her exams. Our head of year paid for her to take them. I know back then 93/94 it was £15 for each exam. She is the third out of 5 siblings. So this teacher had been involved with this family for years. She knew the family circumstances. But her and another one of her siblings are the only ones who work full time. She is the only one who owns her own home. She retired when we left I'm sure she would be proud of her if she knew what she's achieved I am.

In theory if a student is absent for 15 days in an academic year (don’t need to be consecutive) then the LA is supposed to step in and ensure that they are still receiving some sort of education (hospital school, tutors etc) but in reality that never seems to happen