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The government is sending “mixed messages” to schools on attendance by expecting them to be simultaneously “empathetic and uncompromising”, leaders have warned.

And headteachers have dismissed new guidance telling schools how to communicate with parents about absence as “awful”, and warned it will make it “all but impossible” for schools to hold families to account for their child not attending.

There are also concerns that by focusing on one-off absences in its recent announcements, the government is overlooking the impact of the special educational needs and disabilities crisis on severe absence.

Ministers have made improving school attendance a key priority and have introduced a series of policies aimed at achieving this.

Government focus on attendance

Since taking office, Labour has set up attendance and behaviour hubs, given every state school in England an AI-powered minimum attendance improvement target, and set a national target in its schools White Paper to boost the national attendance rate to over 94 per cent by 2028-29.

The for non‑attendance has also been reformed by increasing the fines and introducing a national cap of two fines per parent per child within a three‑year period. Once a parent exceeds two fines, no further penalty notices can be issued, and the case must be considered for prosecution.

And in new Ofsted inspections, schools now receive a graded judgement on attendance.

But sector leaders are now voicing fears about the expectations being placed upon them after was produced, telling schools how they should communicate with parents about the need for their child to attend school.

In this guidance, the DfE tells schools not to use “confrontational” tones and warns that messages that impart blame, imply poor parenting or prioritise school metrics over the child can “push families away”.

It also says that when inviting parents to a meeting about their child’s attendance, staff should avoid enforcement language or threats of escalation.

And when conducting phone calls with parents, schools should use a “curious, non-confrontational tone” and avoid using “we know it’s difficult” messages, as they can be seen as “patronising”, according to the DfE.

‘Mixed messaging’ for schools

This requirement to strike a conciliatory tone, on top of the pressure to meet attendance targets, means schools are faced with “mixed messaging”, according to Julia Polley, headteacher at The Wensleydale School in North Yorkshire.

Ms Polley told ����Vlog: “I wouldn’t use anything in this guidance - it’s just awful. And if they actually think parents are going to respond to any of what they have suggested, they don’t understand…I don’t know who it’s aimed at.

“What a mixed message - go hard on attendance and then have nice conversations with parents.”

For Vic Goddard, chief executive at Passmores Cooperative Learning Community in Essex, the need to drive up attendance while managing relationships with parents creates a “clear tension”.

Mr Goddard said most leaders would agree that communication with parents should be respectful and supportive, but added: “The difficulty is that at the same time schools are being judged, compared and increasingly held accountable for attendance figures in a very high-profile way.

“That can create a situation where schools are expected to be simultaneously empathetic and uncompromising.

“The vast majority of schools already work incredibly hard to build relationships and support families before moving to more formal processes, but the public narrative can sometimes imply that attendance is simply about schools ‘trying harder’.”

One headteacher, who wished not to be named, told ����Vlog there are “so many caveats” in the guidance about the need to be supportive and acknowledging difficulties, that it is “all but impossible to hold families to account if they don’t want to be challenged”.

“The guidance is largely based on the idea that there’s a whole host of families staying off and not giving reasons. Mostly (in primary at least) they give illness as a reason (including mental wellbeing) and schools’ hands are largely tied,” they said.

“But then schools will be judged by Ofsted for not having done enough, or attacked by parents - with the well-known complaint issue - in all directions.”

DfE ‘overlooking’ SEND impact

The head also warned that the DfE’s guidance “overlooks the fact that a lot of the severe absence will be families arguing that their children are not in an appropriate setting because of SEND failings”.

“No wonder [the government] are trying to move the focus to the occasional absences,” they said.

This was echoed by Mr Goddard, who said: “I think there is a risk that focusing heavily on one-off absences misses the scale of the challenge around persistent and severe absence, which is where schools are investing huge amounts of time, staffing and resource.

“Many of the young people with the lowest attendance have very complex needs linked to anxiety, SEND, poverty, family circumstances and wider challenges that sit well beyond the school gate.”

Taylor Swift gig highlighted for one-off absence

Last week the DfE announced its intention to curb “one-off” absences, and cited data showing big localised drops in school attendance after a Taylor Swift concert and rural county shows.

DfE researchers found that after a Taylor Swift gig in Liverpool on Thursday 13 June 2024, there was a “large increase” in absence for Year 9 and Year 10 girls compared with the same day on the previous and following weeks.

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To reduce the “one-off” absences, the DfE has provided schools with new tools to monitor patterns of non-attendance, and proposed new initiatives based on “successful practice from schools across the country”, such as permitting pupils to skip the lunch queue on their birthday.

Speaking in Birmingham this week, education secretary Bridget Phillipson told a Regional Improvement for Standards and Excellence (RISE) attendance conference that the reason she takes a “hard line” on occasional days off is not to “pick fights” or “grandstand” but because “one-off days add up”.

Responding to the government announcements, Leora Cruddas, chief executive of the Confederation of School Trusts, said: “While some of the guidance is helpful, some parts are too low-level and granular - like focusing on specific days in an annual calendar and attempting to introduce largely unevidenced policy on the basis of that analysis.

“The biggest attendance gains over recent years have come from clear expectations, strong systems, regular data review, early intervention, consistent strong leadership and scaling what works across schools.”

Gary Wilkie, chief executive at Learning in Harmony Trust, said the focus on attendance data and targets was “understandable” but urged caution not to “lose sight of the human reality behind those figures”.

Mr Wilkie told ����Vlog that if schools are pushed too far towards a compliance-driven approach, there is a “risk of unintended consequences for families and school communities”.

Schools intervening to stop prosecutions

Data obtained by ����Vlog suggests that schools in some areas are intervening to prevent a hardline approach being taken on prosecution for non-attendance and failure to pay fines.

Information provided by around a dozen councils shows that schools had a role in decisions not to pursue prosecutions.

In Bolton in 2024-25, more than half of the 259 prosecutions that were withdrawn (151) were done so at the school’s request.

In Kirklees over the past three years, 104 cases were withdrawn because of no response from schools when witness statements were requested, and another 62 were withdrawn by the school or by the local authority.

And in Sutton, more than 400 cases in the past three years were withdrawn because schools agreed no further action was necessary despite non-payment of fines.

Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, welcomed the new DfE communication guidance, acknowledging that improving attendance needs to be a “joint enterprise” between schools and families.

However, he said there is a “finite limit to what yet more government guidance - however well-meaning - can achieve”.

He told ����Vlog that wider support, including attendance officers and better capacity in mental health services, is what schools need to reduce absence.

“As ever, the aim of improving attendance - which everyone supports, and which everyone is doing their utmost to achieve - is hampered by the lack of sufficient resources,” Mr Di’Iasio said.

Helen Woodward, executive head at a primary school, told ����Vlog that the government is right to set targets and pursue consistency, but warned the guidance “can fail to acknowledge the reality” of teachers and schools also needing to focus on educating pupils who do attend school.

Ms Woodward, whose school receives funding from the INEOS Forgotten Forty project for settings in the most deprived areas, added that attendance can be “bucketed as an issue for schools to fix, rather than being considered and treated as a key symptom of a broader problem”.

����Vlog has approached the Department for Education for comment.

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