Unauthorised absences up despite government crackdown
Unauthorised absences have risen across primary and secondary schools, despite attempts by the Government to crack down on attendance.
According to recently released figures, pupils taking days off schools without an authorised reason rose from 0.9% in 2015-16 to 1.1% in the autumn-spring terms in 2017.
The main driver of the rise in unauthorised absences has been unauthorised family holidays, according to the report published by the Department for Education.
In the most recent data, 86.6 per cent of pupils had a least one session of absence, compared to just 85.4 per cent the year before.
The percentage of sessions missed due to unauthorised family holidays rose from 0.2 per cent in 2015-16, to 0.3 per cent last year.
This rise comes despite the Government winning a high-profile case against a parent, Jon Platt, at the Supreme Court in April.
Judges ruled against parents taking their children on holiday during term-time.
The report says: “Interpretation of any trends should be treated with caution due to the volatility of autumn and spring term absence figures.”
The overall absence rate across state-funded primary and secondary schools also increased slightly, from 4.4 per cent in autumn-spring 2015-16 to 4.5 per cent in autumn-spring 2016-17.
The percentage of pupils who are, or may become, persistent absentees also rose this year – from 10.3 per cent in autumn and spring 2015-16 to 10.4 per cent in autumn-spring 2016-17.
Overall, the number of days missed due to absences rose from 34.2 million in the autumn to spring of 2015-16, to 37.4 million last year. This equates to pupils taking around half a day more off school.
Read the full report from the Department for Education here.