Children are expected to attend school every day. If your child is too unwell to attend, then please email the school at absence@bishopchavasseschool.org.uk to provide

details: their name, class, the date/s of absence and a brief description of the cause.

We recognise that there may be other medical or dental appointments that take place during school time. Wherever practical or possible, these should be arranged for school holidays but where this is not possible then the school must be notified of the child’s absence, in advance, as set out above.

Other term time absences

The law requires children of school age to be in full-time education during the 38 weeks of the school year. It is highly disruptive to your child’s education if they are absent due to family holidays or other non-urgent reasons. In addition, there is then a knock-on impact on other children in the classroom because teaching time needs to be spent with your child upon their return to help them catch up with what they have missed.

For this reason, the law requires that any non-medical absence from school must be authorised. For our school, this means that a written case must be made for consideration by the Headteacher, at least three weeks in advance.

Parents should note that authorisation is only expected to be granted in exceptional circumstances. If absence is unauthorised then this is counted as truancy and, in line with local schools, a fixed penalty notice will be served for unauthorised absences of 5 days or more.

We recognise that in addition to the situations above there may be genuine short-term domestic or family emergencies and these will be dealt with sensitively and using common sense on a case-by-case basis.

Lateness

Parents must make every effort to ensure their child is in school by the time Registration takes place. It is disruptive to both your child and everyone else if a teacher’s time has to be spent going over the beginning of lessons more than once. Parents whose children are habitually late into school can expect to be contacted by our Education Welfare Officer, to find out what more can be done to ensure their children attend school on time. The Department for Children, Schools and Families has produced a leaflet setting out the responsibilities of parents in ensuring that their children attend school, a copy of which can be found by clicking here.