Attendance and Punctuality

• At OLMC we closely monitor attendance levels.
• Parents are urged to make sure that their child attends school regularly and on time.
• Please support the school with this by ensuring your child arrives punctually at the start of each school day and that family holidays are kept to school holidays.

The School Day

The school day begins at 8.50am, and 08:45am for EYFS. Punctuality is very important to make a prompt start to the day and we would expect the children to arrive no later than 5 minutes before start.  The School gates are normally closed at 09:05am. The school day finishes at 3.10pm Parents are asked to take great care when parking near school, in the interests of the safety of the children, as they arrive and leave school.

• These hours are subject to review by the Governing Body

What do you if your child is late, ill or has an appointment?

Registers are marked by 8.55am and all students will receive a late mark if they are not in by that time. At 9.10am the registers will be closed. In accordance with legal regulations, if a child arrives after that time they will receive a mark that shows them to be on site, but this will not count as a present mark and it will mean they have an unauthorised absence. 

LATE

Children who are late should come to the main school reception where they will need to be signed in the Late Book by the adult bringing them to school. 

ILLNESS

If your child is ill, please telephone or email the school on the first day of absence and each day following, leaving a message on the answerphone to say why their child is absent. This should be followed up by a note to the teacher on return. These absences will be recorded as Authorised. Once the registers have closed office staff will look at the absences and if we do not have a reason we will contact the parent.

APPOINTMENTS

A request for a child to leave school to attend an appointment will be granted. Where possible appointments should always be made outside of school hours. Children who need to leave the school during the school day for an appointment must be collected from the main entrance by a responsible adult. 

Absence and Holidays During Term Time

• Parents are advised that is now against the law to take family holidays in term time.  Penalty Notice Fines are issued where family holidays are taken in school time.
• The Headteacher can, in exceptional circumstances, authorise absence from school but this does not apply to family holidays taken in term time or family weddings abroad.
• Parents/carers are also asked to arrange medical/dental appointments outside school hours wherever possible.
• Holidays requested at the beginning of any new term or during SATs periods can not be authorised for any reason. This follows the Local Authority Policy on attendance in school. Where unauthorised absence is taken, a fixed penalty notice of £60 can be issued (Section 444(a) of the Education Act 1996 empowers the local authority to issue Penalty Notices to parents/carers)

Attendance Records Monitoring

The school will monitor the attendance of any child where there is a concern. Whilst the Headteacher, Learning Mentor and Educational Welfare Officer wish to work closely with families to support good attendance, the Headteacher has a duty to each child to ensure that they attend regularly to access education. Remember parents, we wish to work with you to provide the best possible education for your child and regular attendance is a key feature of any child’s continued progress.

The School Attendance Officer visits the school regularly to check on attendance and punctuality and makes home visits if necessary. This Service also issues fixed penalty fines for intermittent or prolonged non-attendance without good reason, or for persistent lateness.

Attendance Policy

For more attendance information, please refer to our Attendance Policy on the school policies page.