For our children to achieve their potential we encourage parents and children to understand that every day counts.  Excellent attendance and arriving at school on time will support your child’s achievement. As a school we strive to achieve a goal of at least 96% attendance.

Please see our Attendance Policy for more information.

Our attendance team

Our attendance team understand the importance of good attendance on our children’s learning. Therefore, we make an effort to reward our Bankside Best Attendees. We have a wide variety of incentives whether it is class prizes for the best attendance or our whole school attendance raffles. The raffles are done every half-term, along with 100% certificates and medals for our Attendance Superstars.

Punctuality

The school day starts at 8.45am and finishes at 3.15pm.

The gates open at 8.30am and close at 8.50am. Children who arrive after 8.45am will be marked as late. It is the parent’s responsibility to ensure children are at school on time. If your child is persistently late you may be invited to a meeting to discuss this, or you may be issued with a penalty notice.

Absence

If your child will not be attending school please inform the school by phone on 0113 3368383 by 9:00am on the first morning of absence. You can also report absence by visiting the school office.

If no contact is made to school via telephone or at the school office, our attendance team will contact you by phone or will make a home visit to get a reason for absence.

If your child becomes ill during the school day we will contact you so you can collect them.

To avoid illnesses spreading around school we ask that parents DO NOT send their child to school if they have had

· Fever in the past 24 hours

· Vomiting in the past 24 hours

· Diarrhoea in the past 24 hours

School advice otherwise is if they are out of bed and able to walk to school they should be in school.

If your child becomes ill during the school day we will contact you so you can collect them. It is therefore important that have working telephone numbers for you in order to get in touch with you.

Appointments

If you need to take your child to a doctor, dentist or hospital please try to get an appointment before or after school. We know this isn’t always possible so please only take your child out of school for the appointment and not the whole day. If you have an appointment card or letter from the hospital please bring it in to show the attendance team.

Going away?

Schools are no longer allowed to authorise any requests for a child to be taken out of school for a holiday during term time. We expect that parents will take their child on holiday during the approved school breaks. It should be noted that there are 175 days each year when a child is on holiday from school.

In very exceptional circumstances, and only then if your child has an excellent attendance record the headteacher may permit up to 10 days absence and this must be requested in advance. You will need to speak to a member of the attendance team at the school office and complete an Exceptional Leave Request Form.