Do I have to attend attendance meeting?!

[HRR107]

What’s the deal with school attendance meetings? I have 3 children and have never had a letter being called to one before. I have been called in as my child was unwell for 3 days on his return to school. He was in for a week, fell unwell with a sickness bug and then was off for 3 days.

Now his attendance is showing at 84% and they want me to come in for a meeting. Should I just call up and point out the obvious here? His attendance is so low because the ratio of him attending school and being off for the time being is going to be in the low zone. As soon as he has been back at school for longer then it will even itself out. He rarely has time off school, he battles through a lot of illnesses and just gets on with it. I’m quite annoyed they are calling me in when they have known me for 8+ years and have never had any issue with any of my children’s attendance.

Ranting over! Basically, do I have to attend this meeting?!

I was idk do exactly that!!
sometimes schools need to think

What a pointless waste of time for all concerned.

It's not the schools, if it's a state school that is, it's the council. Schools have to send them out. They will be perfectly aware why your child has been off, so no need to 'rant'. Just call them.

I wouldn’t go to that, because it is clearly ridiculous.

It'll probably be an automated thing that gets flagged, and they won't have the time to look at each kid/family individually and look at past attendance etc. An email to whoever the meeting is with would probably work just fine. Just point out his previous attendance, reasons for it this time, and obviously the fact that it makes the % look awful this early in the year. It would be a total waste of time to actually have this meeting!

I would go, because it’s clearly some sort of an administrative thing. But not going makes it look worse. At the end of the day, all the council and the computer system will see is the percentage attendance and the fact you didn’t attend the meeting - way more of a red flag.

I'd ring, offer a chat by phone, schools are expected to dmonstrate they are identifying potential persistent absenteeism early onand addressing it... especially with regards to rrivial illness. Communicating with school helps everyone as school can demonstrate they have opened communication and you are engaging with them.

By waiting for end of the term to identify 'real' problem cases it is harder to try and address barriers / behaviours if a pupil has issues and the pattern of school life has beine established without anyone addressing any issues, and there is a a decreasing time to try and get attendance % to rise.

It's not done for fun, if anything if a parent us struggling to get their child in this could help open communication and asking for support with school. And sonetimes bizarrely sone parents dont acrually realise the impact the odd day off has on a child's attendance - being aware can sometimes help a parent understand odd says here and there add up.

A red flag for what though? That percentage will go up and up as we go further through the school year until it’s no longer a problem anyway. I find it hard to believe that the people who would be the ones looking into “red flags” of attendance would do anything about 3 days off for a sickness bug. Given the 48 hour rule, unless the bug starts at the weekend, 3 days off is pretty much guaranteed.

I wouldn’t go. But I would email to explain why I wasn’t going. And the reason would be that the absence was due to the school’s own 48 hour policy.

I had this last year - having not missed a single day for illness in reception my daughter then caught 2 sickness bugs in the first 3 weeks of school in y1. I got a letter at October half term, as did my friend whose daughter had an operation in September and a week off as a result. But it was just a letter, not a meeting request. That does seem odd at this point in the year for a child with no previous concerns. As you say, it’s just the ratio at this point in the year, and will likely correct itself by the end.

As pp said, school will have had these procedures forced on them. go to the meeting, it will take 5 minutes. They probably have to pretend they are concerned, you pretend you are sorry/will prioritise attendance (just as per the last 8 years) they note "one off illness" on the file, then you can all relax and they have a nice example to show the auditor.

Edit - it's like I have to do stage 1 sickness meetings with my team members at work. I usually write down "no concerns whatsoever" but if there wasn't a system, we'd have no way to weed out the persistent sickie pullers.

Bloody hell. Can the previous posters hear themselves? Go to the meeting because it’s a pointless waste of time but not the school’s fault? I can only assume these people have limitless time to waste doing pointless shit. There is no way in hell you would catch me taking time off work to go to a meeting with the school where we all agree that yes, 3 days out of 20 is a higher percentage than 3 days out of 190, and no, there is nothing I can do to prevent my child from being sick for 3 days. OP, if it were me, I’d send an email. And I’d struggle to rein in the sarcasm and suggestions that they revisit their own lessons in percentages. Whether you attend the meeting will, I guess, depend on how time and inclination you have to spend doing pointless shit.

I’d probably also suggest they consider their own infection control measures, to avoid children picking up sickness bugs at school and having to have 3 days off.

I'd ask if a maths teacher will be attending to explain how percentages work.

Actually I'd just be ignoring the letter. If your child generally has no difficulty attending school and has simply had a few days off because illness is always rife in September and October then there are no attendance issues.

What a waste of everyone's time.

Low attendance plus a parent not attending the meeting will look even worse. The computer doesn’t show the reasons for the low attendance. All OP has to do is go, say what she has said in this post, the school will likely agree it’s stupid and they’ll all be on their way.

This is probably going to happen to me. Twice in the last 3 weeks ds has randomly vomited so that’s an automatic 48 hours he’s not allowed to attend school although he was absolutely fine in himself. I really hope it doesn’t happen again .

But he can attend school. The school would have no way of knowing. You need to be able to make that judgment for yourself - if he’s fine in himself, has randomly vomited and doesn’t vomit again, he’s fine to go to school. This is why schools pull up on attendance.

But he’ll tell them

I would call the school and talk to them about it. Two years ago my DS had a serious accident at school and ended up having about 3 weeks off (during this time he went back to school several times and every time they sent him straight home again). It was at the beginning of the school year so his attendance dropped to under 50%. I was warned by a very apologetic member of staff that we’d get an automatically generated attendance letter. The letter actually never arrived - it’s a private school so they must have been able to use their discretion given the circumstances - but I assume in virtually all cases attendance letters are generated automatically because computers have no discretion.

Yes it is generated but having been through attendance it does seem early to flag because you don’t need much to fall below a percentage

it is quite a high percentage for a meeting as well!

what exactly did you say - there are also red flags now for reporting illness everything has to be very clear as to what it is and any medical evidence best to send

because irritatingly the next stage is to say any absence needs medical evidence in order to be authorised

the new rules are awful!

I would probably go to the meeting, not because of any “red flag” for not attending, wouldn’t give a toss about that.

I’d sit back, see what they had to say, if I had to point out the obvious, I would and then end the meeting.

But what does that mean for my child or for me, if it looks worse? I don’t care. I certainly don’t care enough to take time off work to attend this meeting. I would always back the school on discipline & behaviour etc. And DD in year 2 actually has 100% attendance since starting reception (but this is pure luck that she hasn’t been ill). But this is something I would not care about.

This year's updated Safeguarding targets for schools include keeping a close eye on attendance. They're just doing their due diligence. As much of a pain as it is at this point, I'd just go to the meeting to get them off your back. Avoiding it will probably flag further safeguarding concerns.

This^^

I work in schools and the parents who "look bad" (and I don't even think op would look bad here), at worst get an eyeroll between staff. Nobody is carting them away or removing their children for looking bad

Obviously if it was just a small part of a bigger picture where parents were being negligent, that would be different, but this isn't the case for op

Dear school,

Thanks for your letter, which I assume was generated automatically. Given DS’s good attendance from previous years and the fact that this 84% figure has been generated from 3 days of entirely necessary sickness absence at an early point in the term, can we agree that it is not necessary?

Best wishes etc

But that’s ridiculous. The OP’s time is also important. Why should her work attendance record suffer? That could have actual consequences.