{"id":55896,"date":"2015-03-26T10:33:59","date_gmt":"2015-03-26T10:33:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?guid=2f5a2bf57604d69cd6fd10cb2f8d4de6"},"modified":"2015-03-26T10:33:59","modified_gmt":"2015-03-26T10:33:59","slug":"press-release-number-of-pupils-regularly-missing-school-falls-to-lowest-level","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?p=55896","title":{"rendered":"Press release: Number of pupils regularly missing school falls to lowest level"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"govspeak\">\n<p>Fewer pupils are persistently missing school than ever before &#8211; and the number of pupils in this category has almost halved since 2010, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/statistics\/pupil-absence-in-schools-in-england-2013-to-2014\">new figures published today (26 March 2015) reveal<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>The fall in young people missing classes has come after teachers were given new powers to tackle absenteeism, as part of the government\u2019s plan for education.<\/p>\n<p>Figures show the number of pupils regularly missing school in 2013 to 2014, classed as persistent absentees, is down nearly 200,000 over the last 5 years &#8211; the lowest level since comparable records began. <\/p>\n<p>The number of persistent absentees has dropped every year since 2009 to 2010 &#8211; and has fallen by 46%, from 433,130, over the period.<\/p>\n<p>The statistics released today follow recent research that shows even short gaps in a child\u2019s school attendance can reduce their chances of achieving good qualifications by as much as a quarter. <\/p>\n<p>Today\u2019s figures also reveal:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>the number of school days missed due to absence has fallen by a quarter since 2009 to 2010 when 57.0 million days were lost <\/li>\n<li>the number of days missed due to family holidays fell by 1.4 million last year &#8211; and has dropped by 2.3 million days since 2009 to 2010 <\/li>\n<li>pupils missed an average of 7.9 days over the full 2013 to 2014 academic year &#8211; down from 9.3 days the year before<\/li>\n<li>every single local authority saw a fall in their overall absence rates since the previous year<\/li>\n<li>Blackpool saw the biggest drop in the rate of persistent absence &#8211; with a 42% year-on-year fall. 4.3% of pupils regularly miss school in the area<\/li>\n<li>Newham had one of the lowest absence rates in the country despite high levels of deprivation, with an overall absence rate of 4%. The persistent absence rate also stands at just 2.6%<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>A pupil is classified as \u2018persistently absent\u2019 if they miss around 15% of school  &#8211; which equates to around 18 months of lesson time over their whole school career.<\/p>\n<p>School Reform Minister Nick Gibb said:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>We know that missing school can be hugely detrimental to a pupil\u2019s life chances &#8211; but we now have around 200,000 fewer young people regularly missing lessons than 5 years ago.<\/p>\n<p>Every single lost day counts &#8211; which is why as part of our plan for education we have put teachers back in charge so they can clamp down on classroom absence.<\/p>\n<p class=\"last-child\">Fewer school days are being lost than ever before thanks to our reforms &#8211; giving children the best possible chance to succeed.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Research published last month showed just how important school attendance is.<\/p>\n<p>Nearly half of pupils &#8211; 44% &#8211; with no absence at key stage 4 achieve the English Baccalaureate, which includes English, maths, science, history or geography and a language.<\/p>\n<p>But just 31.7% of pupils who miss 14 days of classes over their 2-year GCSE courses achieve the same level &#8211; and that fell to 16.4% for those who miss up to 28 days.<\/p>\n<p>The government has made a range of reforms to encourage good attendance from their pupils. Measures introduced since 2010 include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>encouraging schools to tackle the problem of persistent absence earlier. The government reduced the threshold by which absence is defined as persistent from 20% to 15% from October 2011. This means schools are held to a higher standard in performance tables than before<\/li>\n<li>from September 2015, the persistent absence threshold will be reduced further from 15% to 10%<\/li>\n<li>making it clear that headteachers should authorise a leave of absence only in exceptional circumstances rather than as a matter of routine<\/li>\n<li>making clear that teachers can use \u2018reasonable force\u2019 to maintain behaviour and extending their searching powers from 2011<\/li>\n<li>allowing teachers to impose same-day detentions from 2011<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2 id=\"notes-to-editors\">Notes to editors<\/h2>\n<ol>\n<li>Full academic year figures are available for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/statistics\/pupil-absence-in-schools-in-england-2012-to-2013\">2012 to 2013<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/statistics\/pupil-absence-in-schools-in-england-2013-to-2014\">2013 to 2014<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li>Comparisons of any figures to years prior to 2012 to 2013 are based on data for the first 5 half terms &#8211; and exclude the final half term of the academic year.<\/li>\n<li>Pupil absence is one factor that may affect achievement; other factors that may also impact on achievement include background characteristics like <abbr title=\"free school meals\">FSM<\/abbr> status.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<div class=\"contact \" id=\"contact_997\">\n<div class=\"content\">\n<h3>DfE enquiries<\/h3>\n<div class=\"vcard contact-inner\">\n<div class=\"email-url-number\">\n<p class=\"tel\">\n              <span class=\"type\">Central newsdesk<\/span><br \/>\n              020 7783 8300\n            <\/p>\n<p class=\"tel\">\n              <span class=\"type\">General enquiries<\/span><br \/>\n              0370 000 2288\n            <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>New school attendance statistics show the number of persistent absentees is down by nearly 200,000 since 2010.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55896"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=55896"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55896\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=55896"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=55896"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=55896"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}