Attendance
School has a statutory duty to keep your child safe which includes knowing where they are if they are not in school. We appreciate that children are sometimes genuinely ill. If your child is going to be absent due to illness, Parents/carers are requested to telephone on the first day of absence before 8:30am. If you leave a message on the answerphone service before 8:00am please give your child’s name, class and reason for absence and then each morning, if appropriate, for the duration of the absence. If you do not contact the office, school will text and then ring you followed by every contact number we hold for your child until we speak to somebody. If your child is absent for two consecutive days and we are unable to contact anybody, we will visit the family home to ensure that your child/ children are safe and well. If we are still unable to contact a named contact, then we may call 101 to seek police assistance in locating the family.
Rewards for Good Attendance and Punctuality
At Kingston Park, we recognise the importance of good attendance and punctuality and as a result we reward the children in the following ways:
- Perfect attendance. Each day that a class has 100%, they will be awarded a letter which will spell out the words ‘PERFECT ATTENDANCE’. When all the letters are in place, the class will celebrate their success with a treat, this could be an extra playtime, film and a cake etc.
- Weekly mention to the 2 classes with the best attendance and punctuality in the celebration assembly. These classes will be awarded with ‘Kingston Attendance bears/trophy’
- Weekly opportunities to win a prize if 100% attendance has been achieved for the week. The random wheel generator will be spun during the celebration assembly every Friday.
- Vote and win! Each week, every child who has achieved 100% attendance will receive a raffle ticket to place in one of the three voting boxes located on the attendance display. At the end of each term, there will be one lucky winner from each box. Prizes up for grabs include cinema tickets, family days out vouchers and shop vouchers.
Kingston Park Academy Attendance Procedures
If your child’s attendance drops below 96% without good reason, you will receive two letters:
Letter one:
Your child’s attendance has fallen below 96%
No action is taken yet, but an improvement is required.
Letter two:
Your child’s attendance has fallen below 93%
Meeting with Attendance Officer and Pastoral Support Lead
Medical evidence must now be shown for absences.
If there is no improvement to your child’s attendance, a 6 week monitoring plan may be put into place for us to work together to improve your child’s attendance.
If no improvement is seen, further action may need to be taken and we will seek advice from the local authority which may result in a penalty notice being issued.
Punctuality – Arriving and Leaving School on Time
School opens its doors at 8:30am.
Registration begins at 8:40am and ends at 8.45am.
Once morning registration ends, if a pupil arrives after this time, he/she should be accompanied by the parent to school office and they will be marked as L in the register, which means they are late.
If they arrive after 9:15am, they will be recorded as U and this results in an unauthorised absence for the morning, which affects your child’s attendance.
You will receive a letter, a home visit and be invited to a support meeting if we are concerned about the number of Lates your child has.
Kingston Park has a breakfast club and all pupils are welcome. The breakfast club opens at 7.45am and provides your child with a healthy breakfast and the opportunity to develop their social skills. You may find that regular attendance at breakfast club may help improve your child’s punctuality.
Please be prompt when collecting your children from school at 3.10pm.
Unavoidable Medical Appointments
We appreciate that some children have unavoidable medical appointments during term time such as speech and language or hospital appointments. All we ask is that you provide a copy of the appointment letter. If it is necessary for a child to be out of school for this reason, the child should come to school before the appointment if it is after 9:00am and be returned to school directly after the appointment.
Electronic registration is used in all year groups and taken twice per day at 8.40 and 1.00pm. A school day counts as 2 marks of attendance.
Although we cannot mark a child present who is attending an unavoidable medical appointment, if these are their only absences, 100% rewards will not be affected.
Holidays During Term Time
Holidays during term time will not be authorised, unless there are exceptional circumstances, and an Education Penalty Notice will be requested from the local authority. If you are planning to remove your child from school to take them on holiday, please complete a Leave of Absence form, available from the office or below. Please be aware that if you do not complete a Leave of Absence form or inform school that you are taking your child on holiday but school has good reason to believe they are absent due to holiday, then an Education Penalty notice will still be requested.
The Penalty is £60 per parent per pupil and if not paid within 21 days this will increase to £120. Failure to pay the full amount within 28 days will result in a summons to appear in the Magistrates Court.
