Parents have forced three academies to abandon hardline attendance policies in which pupils were told to come in even when unwell and were banned from missing school for period pains without further medical information.
The headteacher of Neale-Wade academy in the market town of March, Cambridgeshire, wrote to parents on Thursday apologising and retracting a previous letter that said that absence for period pain would be marked as “unauthorised” – meaning parents could be liable for fines or prosecution – unless the school had “medical information relating” to this.
One of hundreds of parents who posted angry responses on the town’s Facebook page said: “Are they happy to accept [a GP saying] ‘has ovaries, therefore ovulates’ as medical evidence enough?”
The school’s headteacher, Graham Horn, told parents he was “very sorry” for causing concern. He said: “As a school we are committed to ensuring that whenever possible every student is in school every day.”
But he said after consulting government guidance: “I can confirm we do not require doctor’s notes or other medical information to support reasons for absence, such as period pains.”
GPs do not have a duty to provide letters confirming a child is sick and needs to be absent from school.
Meanwhile in Bournemouth, Glenmoor and Winton academies, which are part of the United Learning trust, were forced to retract a compulsory attendance pledge that it had asked all parents to sign at the end of September. The pledge, which the schools have now said they “got wrong”, asked parents to agree that their child would “always come into school, even if you feel unwell”. It said the school had first aiders and could give students a break in lessons “to get them through the day”.
Adam Sofianos, an education campaigner in Dorset, told the Observer that many parents at the schools were “absolutely furious” and viewed the pledge as “heavy handed”. He added: “They were angry that it took away their power to decide if their own child is well enough to go to school.”
Sofianos said parents feared forcing sick children to come in would result in “more sick children and sick teachers too”.
Headteachers say they are under pressure from the government to turn around a national crisis in school attendance, with a record 150,000 children at state schools classed as severely absent in 2022-23.
In their letter withdrawing their pledge, Glenmoor and Winton schools flagged research by the children’s commissioner that showed that only one in 20 children who are persistently absent achieve five good GCSEs.
The letter said they were “not immune to this issue”, adding “we believe it is worth exploring innovative approaches to addressing it”. But it said this would now be done in consultation with parents.
Approaches to tackling absence vary. Some schools have launched campaigns warning pupils of the impact that missed learning could have on their achievement and job prospects, urging them to strive for 100% attendance. Rewards for not missing a day at some schools include cinema tickets, food vouchers and day trips.
But critics say 100% attendance is unrealistic and puts too much pressure on children.
Dr Kulvarn Atwal, headteacher of Uphall primary school in Ilford and vice-chair of the Headteachers’ Roundtable thinktank, said: “It’s not natural to assume students won’t be unwell or struggling at any point.”
He added: “I haven’t ever had a migraine or a period. How do I know about the pain a child is experiencing?”
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Dr Atwal said attendance drives should instead focus on understanding why certain children are persistently not coming in. “It’s about telling these families and children we want to support you to attend more regularly because your learning is important.”
A mother whose son’s primary school has introduced weekly cash rewards towards an end-of-term treat for the whole class if attendance is 98 per cent or more, told the Observer she was worried that this would lead to bullying.
“I can imagine the whispers if [a certain] child was off again so that means the class won’t get their reward,” she said.
Dr Naomi Fisher, a child psychologist who writes about school refusal, said rewards for those who hadn’t missed a day created “social shame which children, especially teenagers, feel very acutely”.
The letter from Neale-Wade academy had prompted outrage from campaigners, including the charity Bloody Good Period, which said it did not take into account the reality of menstruation and factors including long waits for diagnoses of conditions such as endometriosis, which can cause debilitating period pains.
Dr Sharon Dixon, a GP and NIHR doctoral research fellow at Oxford University, said: “I have no doubt that there is a significant body of young people who experience impactful period pain which may make it difficult for them to concentrate or sit in lessons at school.”
She said as well as “debilitating pain” many girls would be worrying about issues such as “flooding” – heavy bleeding – “and whether they will make it to the next lesson”.
“Rather than questioning the validity of people’s pain, maybe this tells us we need to be navigating how we enable support for them,” she said.
