Government data shows one in five pupils were persistently absent from school last year,<\/a> with an attendance gap between poorer children and their better off peers widening. Home education has also soared in the wake of the pandemic.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Today\u2019s research, supported by charities Impetus, Khulisa and School-Home Support, found an \u201cincreased willingness among parents to take children on holiday during termtime\u201d, a rise in mental health problems and the cost of living crisis were among the \u201cfactors\u201d driving lower attendance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ed Dorrell, partner at Public First, said the findings \u201csignpost a deeply troubling issue that will take many years, a lot of hard work and substantive investment to resolve\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAnyone who thinks this will be the kind of problem that can be resolved by pulling one or two policy levers is sadly mistaken.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The report warned a “range of push and pull factors mean that the impetus to attend every day has been lost as parents wrangle with the cost-of-living crisis, their children\u2019s fragile mental health, unmet special educational needs and post-Covid \u2018new normal\u2019 society”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One mother of children aged five and 10 from Manchester said: \u201cPre-Covid, I was very much about getting the kids into school, you know, attendance was a big thing. Education was a major thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAfter Covid, I’m not gonna lie to you, my take on attendance and absence now is like I don’t really care anymore. Life’s too short.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Parents reported that having a child at home had \u201cgot easier\u201d since Covid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But \u201cdespite popular political and media opinion, the increase in parents working from home is not driving the attendance crisis\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some parents, particularly those from wealthier social groups, said they did work from home more post-Covid, but \u201call agreed that this would not make them more likely to have their children off school\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The report also pointed to a “radical shift in the way term time holidays are viewed, and the scale at which they are being taken”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Parents across all social groups “talked openly about taking their children on holiday during termtime, and those that did not were very sympathetic to it”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One mother from Bristol with a 15-year-old said holidays were \u201cso expensive going during school holidays, for some people it’s the difference between having or not having a holiday\u2026and for me I\u2019ll definitely be taking them out\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe always took them skiing in February half term to try and comply. Now I look back and I think why on earth did I do that? Why didn’t I just take them out for a cheap week in January? I would almost say skiing is an educational holiday.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n One mother from Newcastle with an eight and 10-year-old said they had \u201cages off school\u201d during Covid \u201cso two weeks out in a year is not going to make a massive difference to the fact that the damage has been done\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, parents from poorer families \u201cexpressed a fundamental mistrust of schools\u201d, the report found.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They \u201cdo not think that schools and teachers have the best interests of their children at heart\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many of them identified their children as having \u201cvarying challenges which would impact on their schooling, such as SEN, being bullied, or being long-term sick\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey did not feel supported by schools in tackling or improving these issues.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n More affluent parents \u201calso expressed a disenchantment with school, although they felt more disengaged than angry\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the mothers from Bristol said: \u201cThey do come up with the statistics, don’t they, you know, if you miss one week of school, it\u2019s the equivalent of dropping a grade at a GCSE or something like that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAnd I just think, because we’ve all been lied to so much, that we are becoming a bit more militant. And I just think they are our children at the end of the day and it\u2019s our life, and we can do what we want. I think, you know, good for us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A father from Newcastle said: \u201cYou can’t live your life around what the school wants, and what the local authority wants, because their expectations are a bit unrealistic. Let the parents parent.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Parents also talked \u201cat length about their concerns about their children\u2019s mental health and how this impacted upon their attendance\u201d. They \u201coften blamed schools for not doing enough to support their children\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Paul Whiteman, general secretary of the NAHT school leaders’ union, said schools “absolutely have a role to play in encouraging good attendance, but the reality is they cannot address the issue alone”. <\/p>\n\n\n\n “The government has said tackling pupil absence is a major priority, but we haven\u2019t seen the level of resources required to turn the current situation around.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n A mum from Manchester said her 11-year-old daughter was previously \u201cwell into her sport, confident, outgoing, and then we were put on lockdown\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNow she gets herself worked up about situations. And then obviously, because she gets herself worked up, then she’s getting headaches, stomach aches, she feels sick. So she misses school due to it now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The intersection of SEND and mental health challenges \u201ccame up frequently\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAcross the social spectrum, parents felt like any child who needed additional support for whatever reason were not having their needs met, and that this was significantly impacting upon their attendance.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Report exposes ‘fundamental breakdown in the relationship between schools and parents’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":107782,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1576],"post-theme":[2524],"class_list":["post-189974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-attendance","post-theme-attendance"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t![\"Ed](\"https:\/\/schoolsweek.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/Ed-Dorrell-exp-140px.jpg\")
The report recommended\u2026<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\n
‘Life’s too short’<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
‘Two weeks a year won’t make a massive difference’<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
‘A fundamental mistrust of schools’<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Mental health and SEND concerns <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"Paul](\"https:\/\/schoolsweek.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Paul-Whiteman-2-feat.jpg\")