Ofsted should be given access to live school attendance data that benchmarks a school’s record on absence alongside similar schools, the children’s commissioner has said after unveiling research showing the impact of absence on GCSE outcomes.
The attendance benchmarking information, which would be based on data currently shared with the DfE by schools on a voluntary basis, should primarily be made available to governors so they are able “to hold schools to account and challenge them”, the children’s commissioner has said.
But the data should also be made available to Ofsted in a bid to increase school accountability for an issue that has become “endemic” in key stage 4, the children’s commissioner said.
Dame Rachel’s call comes as she revealed research that showed only 5 per cent of children who were severely absent in both Years 10 and 11- and just 36 per cent who were persistently absent - achieved at least five GCSEs, including English and maths, in 2022.
Severely absent students are those who miss 50 per cent or more of sessions - half days - while students missing 10 per cent of sessions or more are labelled as persistently absent.
The new research found that more than a third of students in England were either persistently or severely absent in either Year 10 or Year 11 during 2020-21 and 2021-22.
Overall, 182,398 students (32 per cent) in England were persistently absent but never severely absent, and 22,365 students (4 per cent) were severely absent.
The analysis brought together the Department for Education’s school attendance data for 2020-21 and 2021-22 with the 2022 GCSE results.
Attendance hubs programme
Dame Rachel also called for an extension of the attendance hubs programme to cover the whole country, as well as national training for attendance officers and school leaders.
The hubs programme was rolled out further after a pilot project run by Northern Education Trust, which involved around 60 schools working together to tackle absence.
The children’s commissioner said she would like schools to be referred directly to the programme if Ofsted identifies attendance as a weakness during an inspection.
Dame Rachel also wants to see the DfE roll out national training on school attendance for school leaders, attendance leads and governors, which would cover how to create a culture of high attendance, how to use data, and how to work with other agencies to create packages of support to re-engage students with a high absence record.
The children’s commissioner also said that if a student misses an extended period of school, school staff should make a “personalised catch-up plan” that “may need to be delivered through additional catch-up sessions”.
Meanwhile, every school should appoint a member of the senior leadership team to manage their attendance policy, Dame Rachel said.
Tackle underlying causes
But Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said that the union would be “surprised if schools were not doing versions of this already”.
He added: “Attendance is such an important issue that it forms a core part of what most leadership teams focus on.”
Mr Barton said that what schools really need is “action from the government over the underlying causes of high rates of absence”.
He added that ministers needed to “accept the need to address issues like rising mental health problems, lack of access to specialist care, very high rates of child poverty and the erosion of local family support services, which has taken place over the past decade as a result of government austerity”.
Dame Rachel also wants to see the attendance mentors programme “scaled up to be offered in all Priority Education Investment Areas” - the areas selected to raise school standards - with funding made available to re-engage all severely absent children in these local authorities.
When questioned by Tes on how much funding the children’s commissioner thought should be allocated to address the issue, Dame Rachel said that she would “always make the case for money to be spent supporting children and young people”.
Rachel de Souza ‘deeply concerned’
Dame Rachel said: “I am deeply concerned by the extent of severe and persistent absenteeism in exam-critical years, which risks undermining young people’s chance of academic success.
“While the reasons for a child’s absence from school are complex and multi-layered, my report shines a spotlight on the impact of post-pandemic absence on attainment.”
She added: “If we don’t act now, we risk failing a generation of children. There must be a culture of regular attendance in place, with schools properly equipped to tackle persistent and severe absence.
Paul Whiteman, general secretary of the NAHT school leaders’ union, said that “not enough is being done to solve persistent absenteeism”.
He added that a “decade of cuts to services has seen both mental health care and the teams who used to support schools with attendance decimated”.
A DfE spokesperson said that the government is providing support for around 400,000 pupils through attendance hubs, and the Attendance Action Alliance is supporting the delivery of practical support to schools to further raise school attendance.
The spokesperson added: “This is on top of our direct work with persistently and severely absent children and their families, where trained mentors are providing tailored support to overcome barriers and support these children back into school.”
