Good achievement is directly linked to good attendance. All of the research that has been completed surrounding this issue shows that students who attend school regularly also make good progress. The exam results from the GCSE results in 2009 show that 66% of students with attendance of 90-100% achieved 5 GCSEs at grades A*-C. Whereas only 30% of students with attendance below 90% achieve 5 GCSEs at grades A*-C.

If you know your son/daughter is not able to attend school through illness please contact College (0116 288 1611) as early as possible. Where a student is absent and we have not been informed you will be sent a text message (or automated answer phone message) alerting you to your son/daughter’s absent. I would encourage all parents/carers to respond to the message you have been sent informing us of why your son/daughter is absent from College. This will enable us to keep our records up to date. We thank all Parents/Carers in advance for assisting us with this.

As attendance is so important to ensure students achieve their full potential I would discourage any parents/carers from taking their child out of college during term time for holidays. If this is unavoidable then a holiday application pack should be collected from reception, completed and returned to the Principal who will decide whether to authorise the holiday or not. When deciding whether to authorise a holiday the following criteria will be taken into consideration. Public exam dates, and the proximity to any exams; the dates for the controlled assessments in the subjects the student is studying; and their attendance for the last 12 months. Holidays will not be authorised during September as the start of term is too important for students to miss.

Published on Wednesday 16th September 2009 at 09:00