Tackling attendance issues across schools continues to be a top strategic priority trust leaders. We know societal issues and pressures (in particular the Covid-19 pandemic) have exacerbated the issues already being experienced within schools across the country and that since the height of the pandemic, whilst there has been some improvement in some areas on attendance levels, it still remains a significant challenge across many schools and trusts. Join us for this members’ breakfast briefing where we will be joined by a leading attendance strategist, to explore some of the root causes of school absence and crucially, some of the mechanisms and approaches for improving attendance across trusts.

In March 2023. the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) published a new report – ‘Lost and Not Found: How severe absence became endemic in England’s schools’ – uncovering the damaging scale of severe absence of pupils from school. Despite recent efforts, the number of children missing half or more of their time at school has continued to grow term on term and  children are disengaging with education entirely at an alarming pace. The report finds that the support for school attendance issues is still a postcode lottery. Persistent and severe absence are often symptoms of complex issues which need to be addressed and we know, as trust leaders, you are determined to explore these issues and put in place the right strategy, policies and approaches across your trust to maximise attendance and engagement for all children and young people.

We will be joined at this breakfast briefing by Michael Gooch, a leading attendance and school improvement specialist, who has worked in education for over 25 years and has worked nationally and internationally. Michael has previously been the Strategic Lead for Attendance and the Strategic Lead for the Access and Engagement Service across the London Borough of Islington and has provided training for school attendance leads in Haringey on behalf of HEP.  He has also undertaken work with trusts and schools as an Attendance Consultant, including undertaking trust wide attendance reviews exploring the effectiveness of data, systems and the whole school/trust approach. Michael has worked as a seconded school turnaround consultant across two US states, and most recently has reviewed schools in the UAE and US. Michael will share his knowledge, experience and expertise in improving attendance across schools and we will, as always, also open up the session to discussions across our networks,

Please note this event is open only to individual members of our national CEO, COO or Education Executive networks. To book your place, please use the form below:

Booking Form