Absence Procedure for parents/carers
The name and contact details of the school staff member pupils and parents should contact about attendance on a day-to-day basis is:
Name: School office team
Email: admin@woolgrove.herts.sch.uk
Telephone: 01462 622422
We monitor and review all pupils’ absence, and the reasons that are given, thoroughly. If a child is absent from school the parent must follow these procedures:
- Contact the school on the first day of absence by 9.30am at the latest;
- The school has an answer phone available to leave a message if nobody is available to take your call. You can also email the office (admin@woolgrove.herts.sch.uk). Please be aware that, if you leave a voicemail to report your child’s absence, you may receive a call from the school so that we may discuss the absence before making a decision as to whether the absence is to be recorded as authorised.
- The school is unable to take messages from transport staff but only from parents/carers. This can be done by emailing the office (admin@woolgrove.herts.sch.uk) or phone call
- Contact the school on every further day of absence, before 9.00am
- Ensure that your child returns to school as soon as possible and you provide any medical evidence, if requested, to support the absence. Medical evidence may be requested (where school have reasonable doubt as to the authenticity of the absences) where your child is having multiple periods of absence which are reported as being due to medical reasons.
- When determining whether a child is too ill to attend school, both parents and school staff can consider the advice contained within the NHS Guidance on School Absence and Childhood Illness:
https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/is-my-child-too-ill-for-school/
If your child is absent, we will:
- Telephone, text and/or email you on the first, and every subsequent day of absence, if we have not heard from you. However, it is your responsibility to contact us.
- If we are unable to make contact with parents by telephone, we will telephone emergency contact numbers, send letters home and a home visit may be made, in the interests of safeguarding.
- The Local Authority will be informed if no contact has been made with parent/carers by the 10th day of absence (or sooner if deemed appropriate) as The School Attendance (Pupil Registration) (England) Regulations 2024 Section 13 requires schools to inform the local authority of any pupils absent from school and where absences amount to more than 10 or more days, either consecutively or irregularly and have been unauthorised. This means school will have unauthorised 20 am/pm sessions of absences. Schools are also under a safeguarding duty, under section 175 of the Education Act 2002 to investigate any unexplained/unauthorised absences. At this point your child will be considered to be “absent from education”
