As a school, we are committed to working alongside you to ensure your child makes the most of their education and achieves the best possible outcomes throughout their school career and beyond. We understand that every family faces unique challenges, and we are here to support you through them.

Our Supportive Approach

When we have any questions about your child’s attendance, our first priority is always to reach out and understand how we can help.

Please see the flowchart below for our school's procedures around attendance. 

Our Pastoral Team may occasionally need to move more quickly through this process depending on individual circumstances, but always with your child's best interests at heart. 

Keeping in Touch About Absences

We are grateful for your continued honesty when reporting absences. When your child cannot attend school, please let us know before the school day begins, providing full details. While we ask you to be specific rather than using general terms like ‘unwell’ or ‘poorly,’ we understand that sometimes you are dealing with complex situations. If we have not heard from you about an absence, we will start contacting families from 9.00am.

Ways to get in touch:

• Ring the school office (01449 613112) and either speak to a member of staff or leave a message on the answerphone (option 1).
• Speak to one of the office staff.
• Send in a written note on the day.
• Send an email to: admin@combsfordprimary.co.uk  

If you need to let us know of absences in advance, please contact the school office for a 'Request of Leave' form. 

Illness and Medical Needs

We recognise that deciding whether to send a child to school when they are unwell can be challenging for parents. The NHS provides helpful guidance in ‘Is my child too ill for school?’ to support these difficult decisions. We understand that you know your child best, but we are willing to make a judgement at school if we feel your child needs to be sent home.

Medical and Dental Appointments 

Appointments should be arranged outside the school day. Where this is not possible, we ask that they are made late in the afternoon to minimise disruption to your child’s learning. Where morning appointments are necessary, you will need to notify school in advance if your child will be returning for lunch. Where evidence of the appointment is received, this would be recorded as an authorised absence.

Understanding Absence Types

All absences are recorded as either ‘authorised’ or ‘unauthorised,’ and both affect your child’s overall attendance percentage. We authorise absences when we understand the valid reasons behind them, and we are always happy to discuss individual circumstances with you.

Supporting Good Timekeeping

We understand that morning routines can be challenging for many families, and we want to support you in helping your child develop good timekeeping habits.

When children arrive late, it can sometimes make them feel unsettled, and they may miss important information or the start of learning activities. We ask that children are ready to learn when registration begins.

There are two different codes which can be used to mark late arrivals on the register. If your child arrives during registration, they will receive an ‘L’ code. If they arrive after registration closes, they’ll receive a ‘U’ code (unauthorised absence), which affects their overall attendance record.

If punctuality becomes a pattern, we will reach out to chat with you about how we can work together to support your family’s morning routine. Our goal is always to help, not to add pressure to your day.

School Day Times

Term Time Holiday 

There is no entitlement in law for pupils to take time off during the term to go on holiday or other absence for the purpose of leisure or recreation, or to take part in protest activities in school hours. In addition, the Supreme Court has ruled that the definition of regular school attendance is “in accordance with the rules prescribed by the school.”

The School Attendance (Pupil Registration) (England) Regulations 2024 sets out the statutory requirements for schools. All references to family holidays and extended leave have been removed. The amendments specify that headteachers may not grant any leave of absence during term time unless there are ‘exceptional circumstances.’ The fundamental principles for defining ‘exceptional’ are events that are ‘rare, significant, unavoidable and short.’ By ‘unavoidable’ we mean an event that could not reasonably be scheduled at another time, outside of school term time.

Penalty Notice Fines

There is now a single consistent National Threshold for when a penalty notice must be considered by all schools in England. This is 10 sessions (usually equivalent to 5 school days) of unauthorised absence within a rolling 10 school week period.

The 10 sessions of absence do not have to be consecutive and can be made up of a combination of any type of unauthorised absence – for example ‘G’ (unauthorised holiday), ‘O’ (unauthorised absence) and/or ‘U’ (late after register closes, coded within the school’s registers). The 10-school week period can span different terms, school years and different education settings. 

Does the school reward good attendance?

Yes! 

Every week the children with 100% attendance are entered into the class Duck Race. This is a fun way to end the week and celebrate the children who have had great attendance that week.              

Every half-term, we award trophies to the two classes with the highest attendance (one trophy shared between Years R, 1 & 2 and another trophy for Years 3 to 6). The winning class are also given a personalised Attendance Champions poster to proudly display on their classroom door. We also celebrate class attendance in weekly whole school celebration assemblies.

Finally, we would like to thank the many parents and carers who support us to achieve high standards of attendance. By working together to improve the attendance of every child in the school, we can be sure that they are receiving the best opportunities throughout their time with us.

If you have any more questions, please do not hesitate to contact us – we are always happy to help!