Attend to Achieve #SchoolTodayFutureTomorrow
Sutton’s attendance strategy seeks to address the needs of children and families in Sutton by removing barriers they may face achieving good school attendance. Our goal is to ensure that every child is able to access and thrive in education. We are ambitious for children and dedicated in supporting them to achieve their full potential both now and into adulthood. As a partnership we are committed to making this a reality and will ensure that Sutton has a coordinated multi-agency response that places children and families at the centre, ensuring that they are able to access meaningful support at the right time and in the right way.
Every day really does count, with good school attendance having a positive impact on a child’s academic and social outcomes both now and in later life. Evidence shows that students with the highest levels of attendance throughout their school years gain the best GCSE and A level results.
- Pupils with higher attainment at KS2 and KS4 had lower levels of absence over the key stage compared to those with lower attainment.
- Pupils who did not achieve grade 9 to 4 in English and Maths GCSEs in 2019 had an overall absence rate of 8.8% over the key stage, compared with 5.2% among pupils who achieved a grade 4 and 3.7% among pupils who achieved grade 9 to 5 in both English and maths.
- Generally, the higher the percentage of sessions missed across the key stage at KS2 and KS4, the lower the level of attainment at the end of the key stage.
- Among pupils with no missed sessions over KS2, 83.9% achieved the expected standard compared to 40.2% of pupils who were persistently absent.
- Among pupils with no missed sessions over KS4, 83.7% achieved grades 9 to 4 in English and maths compared to 35.6% of pupils who were persistently absent.
Beyond the academic results school is essential in supporting children to develop strong and lasting friendships, develop social and life skills, to problem solve, to be creative, and importantly have fun.
We know that for these ambitions to be realised we must, together, own the mantra that “Attendance is everyone’s business”, and collectively build systems and practices that remove barriers. This strategy has been developed to communicate how we are going to do that.