Unauthorised absence has rocketed by 80 per cent at secondary school and 40 per cent at primary school since the pandemic, according to a new analysis.
A report by the Education Policy Institute (EPI), published today, also shows that unauthorised absence has risen over the past academic year by 5.5 per cent at secondary and 1.5 per cent at primary, highlighting ongoing concerns about pupils not engaging in education.
The authors of the report say these overall increases are mostly due to rises in “other” unauthorised absences, which have almost doubled since pre-pandemic to a rate of 1.5 per cent. Unauthorised holidays, by comparison, have only increased by 0.1 percentage points over the same period.
The figures are especially notable because the analysis, based on data from the Department for Education, shows that wider absence rates have fallen over the past academic year - from 6.3 per cent to 5.3 per cent at primary schools and from 8.8 per cent to 8.1 per cent at secondary schools. This has likely been driven by a reduction in absences due to illness as the impact of Covid-19 has subsided.
Pupil absence still high
Despite these improvements in wider attendance, Louis Hodge, associate director of school systems and performance at the EPI, warned that absence remains high.
The underlying factors behind this “might not be anything necessarily in the school system” that can be fixed, he added, citing poverty and the state of child and adolescent mental health services as possible influences.
Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, told Tes that the increase in unauthorised absence is a concern and likely being driven by several factors, such a students “being unable to cope with the pressures in their lives” and a breakdown in relationships between families and schools.
He added: “Sitting behind this are issues such as unmet special educational needs, mental health and wellbeing problems and the after-effects of the disruption caused by the pandemic.”
Vulnerable children worst affected
Today’s report also reveals that while overall attendance has improved, disadvantaged pupils and those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) “had the smallest reductions in absence of all pupil groups”. And absence among pupils with an education, health and care plan actually increased over the past year.
Analysis shows that disadvantaged pupils had an extra 2.1 days of absence on average in autumn 2019, rising to 3.0 days in autumn 2022 and 3.2 days in autumn 2023.
The EPI warns that these disparities in absence rates “have led to a ‘double widening’ of the ‘absence gap’ for vulnerable pupils”.
The analysis concludes: “The ‘absence gap’ between vulnerable and other pupils has continued to grow, and would appear to be widening underlying inequalities for these vulnerable groups, whose education has suffered the most in the wake of the pandemic.”
The findings echo a similar analysis carried out by the EPI last year, which showed that between 2019 and 2022 school absence among pupils with social, emotional and mental health needs was almost twice as high as among those with no identified SEND.
Responding to the latest report, Di’Iasio said it is clear that the SEND system needs fixing, and fast.
“Addressing the SEND crisis is an important part of bringing down absence rates, improving student outcomes and closing educational gaps. It must be a key priority for the new government,” he added.
Labour has made moves to suggest change will happen, such as placing responsibility for SEND and alternative provision (AP) within the DfE’s schools group. It has also claimed that its breakfast clubs policy could cut 450,000 days of absence among pupils.
The DfE was contacted for comment but had not replied at the time of publication.
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