Attendance

We aspire to high standards of attendance from all students and families and build a culture where all can, and want to, be in school and ready to learn by prioritising attendance improvement across the school. Dixons Unity Academy is committed to maximising educational opportunities and achievement for all students. For students to gain the best from their time at Dixons Unity Academy, it is vital that they achieve very good attendance and punctuality. Perfect attendance is 100% and our target is an attendance of 95% or above or 100% present with authorised absences.

Promoting Good Attendance

Good attendance is a learned behaviour, and we are committed to recognising the importance of developing good patterns of attendance from the outset. We recognise the importance of good attendance and, alongside good behaviour, make it a central part of our school’s vision, values, ethos, and day to day life. We promote, celebrate and recognise good attendance through the following incentives:

• Weekly small prizes for students who have a week of 100% attendance
• Weekly raffle prize for students who have 95% attendance or above
• ‘Pop up attendance on the day’ recognition events
• End of Cycle cinema trips for students who have 95% attendance or above
• End of year theme park trips for students who have 95% attendance or above

Absence Protocols at DUA

We have in place a coherent system of rigorously monitoring student attendance.

• The family must contact the school as soon as possible of any day of unexpected absence
• If a telephone call or email from the family is not forthcoming, then the absence will be treated as unauthorised
• The absence will remain unauthorised unless the student is above 90% attendance and there is a medical reason
• If the student is absent for more than 3 consecutive days, a member of staff may visit the home of the student. This is to fulfil our safeguarding duties and will be an opportunity to explain the possible consequences of a fine if attendance does not improve. If there is a history of poor attendance, the visit may be earlier

Medical and dental appointments

• Medical and dental appointments should be made outside academy hours. Any urgent medical and dental appointments will only be authorised on sight of proof by completing the ‘Request for Medical Leave of Absence’ form which is available from the attendance team. This must then be authorised by the attendance team

Leave of absence during term time

• Leave of absence during term time is not permitted. Any extended absence from the academy will be counted as unauthorised and will normally lead to a fixed penalty notice from the local authority. In order to avoid personal opinion and to ensure complete fairness for all, we refer all planned leave of absence to the authority.

Students who are late

• Late to school is defined as students not being in registration when the register is taken. If a student arrives after 9am, then an unauthorised absence code of ‘U’ will be applied to the register. Students need to be in the academy for 7:56am to ensure they are prepared and organised for the learning that day. The attendance team will send a text message to parents / carers informing them when their child is late. Lateness results in a same-day correction in line with the Behaviour policy.

Interventions for Poor Attendance

The school actively promotes very good attendance and discourages unjustified absence. 90% attendance sounds good to some people, but this is half a day missed every week and the student falls into the category of ‘persistently absent’. Promoting very good attendance and punctuality prepares students for the disciplines of adult working life and is a key priority for the academy. Our aim is to build positive relationships between home and school to secure the foundations for good attendance. In working in partnership with families, we will discuss the link between attendance and attainment and wider wellbeing, and challenge parents’ views where they have misconceptions about what ‘good’ attendance looks like.

If a student’s absence goes below 90%, the student will be formally monitored with family involvement. The persistent absence threshold is 10%. If a student’s individual overall attendance rate is greater than or equal to 10%, the child will be classified as a persistent absentee.

In the first instance, we will:

• Support students and parents by working together to address any in-school barriers to attendance
• If the needs and barriers are individual to the student this may include provision of mentoring, or where appropriate an education, health and care plan/reasonable adjustments
• Where barriers are outside of the school’s control, we will work together to support students and families to access any support they may need voluntarily
• As a minimum, this will include meeting with students and parents at risk of persistent or severe absence to understand barriers to being in school and agreeing actions or interventions to address them
• This may include referrals to services and organisations that can provide support if the needs are wider and a whole family response is more appropriate, this is likely to include a voluntary early help assessment

Where engagement in support is proving challenging, we will hold more formal conversations with the families and the student. These meetings will clearly explain the consequences of persistent and severe absence to the pupil and family and the potential need for legal intervention in future. These meetings will also be an opportunity to continue to listen to and understand the barriers to attendance and explain the help that is available to avoid those consequences. Where voluntary support has not been effective and/or has not been engaged with we will work with the local authority to:

• Put formal support in place in the form of an attendance contract or an education supervision order
• Issue a Notice to Improve and / or penalty notice where support would not be appropriate or has not been successful or engaged with
• Prosecute families where all other routes have failed or are not deemed appropriate