Government cracking down on school non-attenders. What happens in practice.

Cross post Iam.

Since covid when schools were locked down for so long many more children are staying home for all sorts of reasons.
It’s obviously upsetting for the parent if they have kept in touch every day but the school staff are busy snd given so many children can be absent do not have time to call every parent.
I was an education welfare officer for a couple of years s long time ago snd it’s sometimes difficult, though only 4 visits a day woukd have made it much easier.
I visited homes alone and much later as a SW in child protection I was still visiting families alone , was seriously assaulted and had to take early retirement, so am pleased they now work in twos.

The govt has realised that statistics on school absence have been increasingly concerning since lockdown. Many parents don’t seem to see the regular attendance as essential. It’s not like something out of soviet Russia nanna8 for the state to try and improve this.

I imagine visits are in twos for health n safety reasons. I’m surprised though, that the head teacher hadn’t raised this with’ parents before escalating.

M0nica that sounds very heavy handed. I think that you are due an apology. I have no idea of where Welfare Officers are from. My school employed no such and the Attendance Service was pretty much disbanded years ago.
I do, however, have concerns about home schooled children. I am sure most are HS for good reasons and their families are doing their best to educate them appropriately.
However, HS is a get- out- jail- free card for any potential abuser, religious fanatic, or utterly idle parent/ carer. In school, children are seen by others and are tested frequently ( SATs et al) . Why not rule that HS children are seen at certain times and their progress assessed? This would not trouble conscientious parents or carers, and would fire a warning shot across the bows if the other groups. Of course, it would cost money so maybe I'm dreaming here.
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Galaxy

I dont know if it's to do with things being lax it's to do with the statistics on attendance which have become of increasing concern since the pandemic. I suspect there will be furth

Yes, statistics on education seem to be the root.

As to your post about Home Ed. I wouldnt be so sure.
I read a long time ago, the reason that Home Ed is not well sorted, is because if it was, the government would be open to being sued for giving pupils a bad education.

You can imagine just how many people would sue!!

VioletSky

I don't think she should be upset, stuff like this is horrible, truly but she has done nothing wrong, children have also been very poorly this year. I've never seen so much illness

I am so glad this thread has been started.

I think "I've never seen so much illness" is in part, due to the governtment[is it new] policy, of come into school with sickness, unless a fever[whatever the rules are].

The government are in effect saying, "come in, spread your germs around". To other pupils and staff.

Maybe a tick box exercise as you say, but if a parent was calling a child in sick when the child had been abused or neglected and no visit was made they’d get rightly criticised. It can’t be “we know this child is from a good family so we won’t bother” isn’t really part of their brief. Presumably they were satisfied all was above board after their visit.

I just felt that given an older child had gone through the school without a single days absence and that, in this case, school and parent had been in regular communication for some time because the child had been taken ill at school a number of times and had other problems in school arising from his illness. The school knew he was ill.

He is also an active part of the school setting up and running a war gaming (or Dungeons and Dragons) club with over 30 members.

I felt the callers had a tick list of, say 4 visits a day, and they put DDiL and DGS on the list because they knew there wasn't a problem so knew it would be an easy peasy visit and a quick tick in a box, and they could go home early.

There are many home schooled kids here in Australia. Compared with the UK I think we are fairly soft on non attendance at school. It is supposedly a legal requirement that kids attend but we don’t have people knocking on your door like something from Soviet Russia if they don’t. Thank goodness. Most of it is done through phone calls or meetings with the school principals. It seems to be more of a problem in the bush.

I suspect there will be further changes in legislation soon particularly around home education.

I dont know if it's to do with things being lax it's to do with the statistics on attendance which have become of increasing concern since the pandemic. I suspect there will be furth

Applying the procedure with no common sense.

The school in the OPs case was using due diligence and safeguarding to check on the child’s non attendance, anything “could” have been happening so I don’t criticize the school, weekly phone calls from a parent could have been covering up a multitude of abuse.

In this case the absence was genuine, long term illnesses are thankfully rare, formal weekly sickness notes from a doctor is not realistic unless it can be done on an automated system linked to continuing treatment.

This is another area which became lax and now is starting to be tightened up. Children are the future and it's important that they are properly educated. If a child needs to be absent for any reason, the parents should inform the school.
In this particular case, there seems to have been a breakdown in communication. An apology is in order.

👍 aonk. I consider trust to be paramount too, but of course know nothing about the set-up of the school in question.
Talk about going in all guns blazing. I would be upset.

It is good that there are welfare checks on children and the officers need to be in twos for self-protection. Lots of abuse of all types, goes on behind closed doors and even in `nice` families. The visit was for the good of the child and had to be without a prior phone call. I don`t see anything wrong in the op and am glad that there is some attempt being made to keep a watchful eye on children who might fall under the radar

A well thought out method of dealing with this situation aonk. Schools usually have a good idea of their families, especially primary schools, and they can act accordingly. This may not be the case with the huge secondary schools we have now. Of course it can go wrong, and does, sadly all too often, because schools didn’t identify the needy child.
No system is perfect, but I do think what happened to Monica’s grandchild was heavy handed and unnecessary given the circumstances.

I was a school governor until quite recently. The school concerned dealt with everything so sensibly and tactfully. The Head would contact the parents and ask them to come and see her or would make a home visit if preferred. After the discussion a referral to the authorities would only be made if she thought it was essential. This way she kept the trust and confidence of parents who may well have been experiencing difficulties.

Meanwhile another child somewhere is being kept off school because they have been left with visible injury caused by abuse. Their parent has also called them in sick every day

Another child has a parent who is having a mental health crisis and they haven't had a cooked meal or a bath for a week but the parent has called them in sick to school

The system might not be perfect but it is needed and the alternative is no one checking in on those children

rafichagran

VioletSky

I don't think she should be upset, stuff like this is horrible, truly but she has done nothing wrong, children have also been very poorly this year. I've never seen so much illness

She is upset that while she is dealing with a sick child, and has provided proof of his illness, plus rung the School everyday, two demanding people turn up on her door step without doing the basic courtesy of ringing first to let her know.

Unfortunately, there have been cases where the parents have been forewarned and made sure the child isn't available at the time.

rafichagran

I think Monicawas talking about the heavy handed way it was done.
It needed a bit of common sense. A phone call, a concerned enquiry about the child's welfare. Not people turning up at the door, when the child is ill. This Mother had provided the proof that was needed.
Personally I would not have been so polite. I would have told them I had provided the proof they required, and I would have told them to leave, waste everyone's time if they wanted to take things further.
I was never bothered by these type of people, but some people are intimidated.

Unfortunately, that is precisely what people who have something to hide would say. (Not implying that was the case here.)

What the welfare officers should have done was cross check what the parents had to say with the reasons given to the school, had a quick chat with the child, made sure that any available medical support was in place and asked whether there was anything which could be done to support the child's learning when absent.

VioletSky

I don't think she should be upset, stuff like this is horrible, truly but she has done nothing wrong, children have also been very poorly this year. I've never seen so much illness

She is upset that while she is dealing with a sick child, and has provided proof of his illness, plus rung the School everyday, two demanding people turn up on her door step without doing the basic courtesy of ringing first to let her know.

I don't think she should be upset, stuff like this is horrible, truly but she has done nothing wrong, children have also been very poorly this year. I've never seen so much illness

I think Monicawas talking about the heavy handed way it was done.
It needed a bit of common sense. A phone call, a concerned enquiry about the child's welfare. Not people turning up at the door, when the child is ill. This Mother had provided the proof that was needed.
Personally I would not have been so polite. I would have told them I had provided the proof they required, and I would have told them to leave, waste everyone's time if they wanted to take things further.
I was never bothered by these type of people, but some people are intimidated.

Children have a right to an education.

Unfortunately there are parents who don't send their children to school enough for various reasons, some not good at all

In reality, this is just checking that children are at home for good reason and are safe

I think it would be hard to exempt some families, even those with long term illness problems, to protect children