Attendance

The Trust will ensure that school, parents, carers, and pupils work collaboratively to remove individual barriers and establish positive relationships to help build strong attendance.

What the Trust expects of parents/carers:

Parents/Carers are legally responsible for making sure their children attend school on time and every day, dressed in full uniform and equipped to learn.

To fulfil this responsibility, we expect Parents/Carers to:

• Promote 97-100% attendance and punctuality with their child.
• Ensure their child arrives at the secondary school they’re enrolled to no later than 08:20.
• Inform the Academy, of any reason that will prevent their child/children attending.
• Ensure that Parents/Carers contact the school before 08:15am on the day of the child’s absence with a valid reason for absence.  
• Contact the school whenever any problem occurs that may keep their child away from the school.
• Inform the school of any forthcoming appointments with evidence of the appointment, and, where possible, arrange appointments outside of the school day.
• Provide at least two up to date contact numbers, one of which must have parental responsibility. This could include parent, carer or family member.
• Use the MCAS app to receive school notices and information.
• Attend meetings when requested to discuss attendance. 
• Provide medical evidence to enable the school to provide appropriate support for students following illness/medical conditions.

What you can expect from the Trust:

The Trust have a continued responsibility to proactively manage and improve attendance.

To fulfil this responsibility, we will:

• Promote 97-100% attendance and punctuality.
• Investigate any unexplained and/or unapproved absence.
• Work closely with parents/carers where a student’s absence is cause for concern.
• Conduct home visits, in line with the home visit process, to ensure the safeguarding of students.
• Support students to achieve good attendance and punctuality and overcome barriers to attendance.
• Support students returning to school after a period of absence.

• Students can enter the building from 08:00.
• The law requires the register to be taken twice a day. However, registers are taken at the start of every lesson throughout the day.
• Each day counts for two marks of attendance or absence (AM/PM).
• AM and PM registers are closed 30 minutes after they have opened. The opening times for AM and PM registers at Wingfield Academy are: 08:30 (AM) and13:00 (PM)
• On the register, a mark is added for every student present (/). Students who are absent are recorded as (N). The attendance team will then proceed to investigate any reason for absence.
• Once a reason for absence is established, appropriate absence codes are recorded in the register (Appendix Two). These codes may be pre-entered where the Trust has received prior information from Parents/Carers.
• If a student arrives after the register opens, but before the register closes, they will report to the attendance office, and they will receive a late (L) mark.
• If a student arrives after the register closes, they will report to the attendance office. The student will not receive a present AM mark. They will be coded as unauthorised (U). This will affect the student’s attendance.
• Sanctions, including detentions, operate for late arrivals. An MCAS will be sent informing Parent/Carer of this. Parents/Carers will receive texts, phone-calls and letters regarding punctuality and may be invited into the school for a meeting if punctuality remains an issue.
• Parents/Carers can monitor their child’s attendance through the MCAS app.
• The closing time for the Academy is 15:00. However, some students may be required to attend outside of school times.

• Punctuality to school is extremely important and students should be in school before the main gates are locked. At Wingfield Academy, the main gates will be locked at 08:20.
• Any student arriving after the main gates are closed will need to enter via the attendance gate.
• On the first instance of lateness, a warning will be issued and logged. A MCAS to confirm this and inform Parents/Carers. For any subsequent lates, the following deterrents will be issued, and a MCAS sent to Parents/Carers: 

Second instance	Thirty Minute Detention
Third instance	One Hour Detention
Fourth instance	Two Hour Detention and Parental Meeting
Fifth instance	2x Two Hour Detentions
Sixth instance	Minibus Cohort and Parental Meeting

• Punctuality will be discussed each week in our Attendance Strategy Meetings to identify students who are persistently late. Interventions will be implemented to support improvements such as targeted reports and parental meetings. 
• Each half term we will reset our expectations around punctuality and commence the above process again, giving the student the opportunity for a positive start to the new half term.