Attendance news and events

Attendance News

Big Norfolk Holiday Fun

Enjoy another year of free activities with the Big Norfolk Holiday Fun!

Earlier this year, the Department for Education announced an extra year of funding for the Big Norfolk Holiday Fun programme. This means children aged 4-16 on benefits-related Free School Meals (FSM) can attend holiday activities for free throughout the Easter, summer, and winter holidays!

This Easter's programme will run from 7-17 April 2025 (excludes weekends and bank holidays, e.g. Good Friday), with a range of enriching activities on offer.

From karate to multi-sports, outdoor adventures in nature to theatre - there will be something for everyone! SEND-inclusive sessions are also available for children and young people with Special Educational Needs and/or a Disability. Children across Norfolk can participate in up to 4 days of these exciting activities during the Easter break.

Benefits of the programme

This programme is a fantastic way to encourage children and young people to try new things, whilst keeping their brains and bodies active over the school holidays, supporting schools to reduce their attainment gaps.

Schools have told us that the BNHF programmes, funded through the HAF (Holiday, Activity and Food) scheme have contributed to improved school attendance. This was reported amongst children who have attended a holiday club, as they were given the chance to build their social skills and make new friends in a supportive environment.

In an NCC Children's Services team report, feedback from 200 pupils across 12 schools revealed that 86% felt less anxious about starting their new school, 74% said they were more familiar with their new school site/staff and 87% said they had made new friends after attending BNHF activities during the summer holidays.

Meanwhile, since Easter 2024, there has been a continued trend of more positive attitudes towards physical activity and food. Over 60% of all winter 2024 programme attendees improved their physical activity levels and almost 70% of attendees were inspired to try new healthy foods or join in with cooking.

Any effort to support the programme is invaluable, ensuring we reach as many eligible children as we can with accessible and enriching activities.

Referrals

We have a small amount of funding available for children and young people not in receipt of benefits-related free school meals, but who would get a lot from taking part in the programme for free.

Referrals can be made for children who are persistently absent, subject to referral criteria.

These BNHF Awarded places are limited and we want to ensure referrals for these places come from professionals rather than parents.

The form to refer a child is here.

Please remember the following:

· ALWAYS check with the family that the child isn't already in receipt of benefits-related free school meals. Families can check here.

· Please be aware, just because one child in a family is eligible, not all their children may be.

· Universal free school meals for reception to Year 2 (approx. 7 years old) is different from benefits-related free school meals.

· Please try to apply as soon as possible, ideally before the end of the school term before delivery starts.

Further information

To find out more about the fun sessions near you, visit Every Move now!

Sign up to know when and how to book activities: Sign up to hear more about Big Norfolk Holiday Fun - Norfolk County Council

Delivered by Norfolk County Council and Active Norfolk, this 5-year initiative is funded by the Department for Education

DfE Attendance Toolkit for schools

I first devised the idea of an attendance hub because of my feeling that there were schools in similar circumstances facing similar challenges, but they were not effectively sharing what is working for them. We now have thirty-one hubs bringing together two thousand schools. In my role as the Government's Attendance Ambassador, I have worked with the Department for Education to go a step further to spread promising practice, by working with attendance hubs and other schools to develop this toolkit.
Rob Tarn, CBE National Attendance Ambassador and CEO of Northern Education Trust.

Schools can now access an attendance toolkit developed in collaboration with Rob Tarn, National Attendance Ambassador, and attendance hub leads. It helps schools identify drivers of absence and adopt effective practice to improve attendance. It provides practical resources across six areas; data and targeted support, culture, people, processes and systems, relationships and communications.

Mainstream secondary schools can now also download an attendance summary report on the monitor your school attendance service.

The report is specific to each school and summarises:

overall attendance and persistent absence compared with national averages
attendance for different pupil groups compared with the national average and previous academic year
pupils in 5% absence bands, by year group

To download your report:

Log into View your education data (VYED) using DfE Sign-in credentials.
Select 'Monitor your school attendance'.
Select 'Your attendance summary'.

Summary of key changes to Department for Education Guidance from 19 August 2024

Following the new regulations coming into force and the statutory guidance coming into effect, the DfE has published a very slightly updated version of the Working together to improve school attendance guidance. There are no policy changes in the document, but additional clarification has been provided in a small number of areas as follows:

Clarification in paragraph 52 that independent schools, standalone nurseries, city technology colleges and city colleges for the technology of the arts do not need to return daily data to the Department. All other schools do.
Clarification in paragraph 180 that penalty notices for pupils found in a public place without good reason during the first five days of a permanent exclusion continue to be charged at £120 (reduced to £60 if paid within 21 days) and do not count towards the 3-year escalation in the same way as penalty notices for absence.
Clarification in paragraphs 309 to 313 that 'supervision' of approved educational activities in regulation 11(d) must be physical.
Adding the statistical meaning for Code C2 at paragraph 342.
Providing further guidance on Code E at paragraphs 368-370, code Q at paragraphs 371 and 372 and Y7 at paragraphs 390-393.

Code Y6 - pupils who are well enough to attend school but are unable to because of public health guidance or law

Further advice in paragraphs 388 and 389 make clear that code Y6 is used where the pupil is well enough to attend but there are Government rules or guidance to limit the spread of infection or disease which say they should not attend. Meaning, the pupil's travel to or attendance at the school would be:

contrary to any guidance relating to the incidence or transmission of infection or disease published by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (or the equivalent in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland), or
prohibited by any legislation relating to the incidence or transmission of infection or disease.

Code T - 'no fixed abode' in relation to mobile children

The School Attendance (Pupil Registration) (England) Regulations 2024 and the Working together to improve school attendanceguidance use the term 'mobile child' to describe a child of compulsory school age who has no fixed abode and whose parent is engaged in a trade or business that requires them to move from place to place. This is a new term but covers the same children as section 444(6) of the Education Act 1996. There are no legal or policy changes to who is covered by this definition, but the updated wording makes clear that any child who meets this definition is a mobile child as it is about mobility rather than ethnicity. The guidance is clear that the T code is used to record absence for a mobile child where their parent is travelling for occupational purposes and they travel with them.

To ensure fairness for families and to improve consistency across the country, Ministers have decided to provide further guidance on how the term no fixed abode must be applied across schools and LAs: 'No fixed abode' means that someone either does not have a settled place where they can live full-time, or they have a place where they can live full-time but they spend substantial periods of time not living there. So a mobile child could be a child whose family travels all year round as part of their trade or business and has no permanent address at all, but it also includes a child who does have a fixed place to live (like a house) but does not live there for a substantial part of the year if their parent is engaged in a trade or business that requires them to travel from place to place. If the child is absent from school while travelling with that parent, then code T applies.

Retrospective deletion from school admission registers

The DfE has asked Local Authorities to clarify with schools that it is not acceptable for schools to backdate or retrospectively delete a pupil from their admission register. In line with regulations and associated guidance, the correct attendance or absence code must be recorded for every pupil on the admission register (the roll) for each session. As soon as one of the grounds for deletion is met then their name must be removed, and attendance and absence are no longer recorded from that date. If the ground for deletion is not met until after the pupil has stopped attending, for example, because reasonable CME enquiries were on going attendance and absence must be recorded up until the day the ground was met (i.e. when the reasonable enquires ended).

Statutory Guidance: Children Missing Education

On 19 August the DfE published revisions to its Children Missing Education guidance to bring it in line with the Working together to improve attendance statutory guidance and the School Attendance (Pupil Registration) (England) Regulations 2024. This guidance replaces the September 2016 version.

The key changes can be summarised as follows:

Section	Key Changes
Local Authorities' Responsibilities	Adds expectations for local authority School Attendance Support Teams. Details the requirement for schools to make 'new pupil returns' and 'deletion returns' to the local authority. Emphasizes the role of local authorities in fulfilling wider safeguarding duties. Provides more detailed guidance on joint working and information sharing. Introduces the need for local authorities to have clear processes for securing suitable educational provision for children once found.
Parents' Responsibilities	Clarifies the process for schools to delete a pupil's name from the register when parents choose home education. Emphasizes the role of Education, Health and Care (EHC) plans or statements of special educational needs (SEN) in home education. Local authorities must assure themselves that the provision being made by the parent is suitable and review the plan or statement annually.
Schools' Responsibilities	Introduces new types of returns (attendance return, sickness return) that schools must make to the local authority. Specifies the conditions under which a pupil's name can be deleted from the register. Emphasizes the importance of accurate and up-to-date admission registers. Schools must notify the local authority when a pupil's name is added to or deleted from the admission register
Making Reasonable Enquiries	Provides more detailed procedures for making reasonable enquiries. Emphasizes joint efforts between schools and local authorities. Lists specific actions to be taken, such as checking local databases, contacting other agencies, and making home visits. Highlights the need for secure communication methods when contacting other local authorities.
Grounds for Deleting a Pupil from the Register	Expands and clarifies the grounds for deletion in line with the updated Regulations. Provides specific conditions under which each ground can be applied. Includes detailed guidance on the deletion process for each ground. Emphasizes the need for joint decisions between schools and local authorities in certain cases.
Children at Particular Risk of Missing Education	Updates and expands the list of children at particular risk. Provides more detailed guidance on each group's specific needs and risks. Includes additional groups, such as children supervised by the Youth Justice System and children of new migrant families. Emphasizes the importance of joint working and information sharing to support these children.

Upcoming events

Attendance Spotlight Webinars

The Attendance Team hosts a regular 'Spotlight' webinar via MS Teams, this is to provide support and guidance on key areas of practice as identified by Attendance Leads. Please see schedule of dates below for the Autumn term. Please note these webinars will all begin at 10.30am and last no longer than an hour. Click on the link to join the webinar of your choice:

Thursday 12 September 2024 - Given the volume of changes and the statutory nature of the guidance, the first session will provide a general overview and act as a Q&A session for school staff.
Thursday 26 September 2024 - This webinar will provide an overview of the online referral form and a re-cap on SFA
Thursday 24 October 2024 - View this webinar to provide a summary of Attendance Codes
Thursday 28 November 2024 - Children Missing Education, this webinar is now available to view
Thursday 19 December 2024 - This Webinar will provide an overview of Norfolk Steps
Thursday 23 January 2025 - This Webinar will provide information on Alternative Provisions
Thursday 6th February 2025 - This Webinar will provide information on Sentencing Guidelines
Thursday 27th March 2025 - Information regarding SENDIASS
Thursday 22nd May 2025 - View this webinar for information on Part time timetables
Thursday 5th June 2025 - Children Missing Education with guest speaker Shelley Horne, Senior Children Missing Education Officer
Thursday 3rd July 2025

Following the webinar the slides can be found on our Training and webinars page.

Countywide Attendance Network Meetings

We use these sessions to provide local and national updates, an opportunity for schools to share and develop effective practice to support improvements in attendance and a chance to spend time with the Attendance Team.

Summer Network Meeting: Thursday 26 June 2025 9.30am-12.30pm

All Network Meetings will be held at The Inspiration Teaching Hub, Hall Road, Norwich, NR1 2RN