SEN and attendance at school - is enough being done?

Yesterday, 15 October, the Department for Education (DfE), along with the Office for National Statistics, published its autumn report concerning the rates of attendance at School for 2013-2014.

The report makes for interesting and somewhat conflicting reading. That is because it already shows what most parents of children with special educational needs (SEN) will already fear; that their children are missing out on education in comparison to their peers without additional needs.

However, with a little further reading, and consideration of previous annual reports, the news is a little more promising. The rate of non-attendance is getting better for children with a Statement of SEN, quicker than for children without any additional needs.

Pupils with a Statement of SEN

The report finds that children with a Statement of SEN have an average rate of 6.6% non-attendance (page 5 of the report). That means that during the school year, the average number of days missed by a pupil with a Statement of SEN is 12.5 days.

The Annual Report published by the DfE in March 2014, covering the period 2012-2013, found that at that time the average rate of non-attendance for children with a Statement was 8.2% (page 4 of the March 2014 report).

In real-world numbers, that means that children with a Statement of SEN spent, on average, 3 more days in school in 2013-2014 as compared to 2012-2013. Therefore, there does seem to be some good news.

What is not such good news is that the report finds that children with a Statement of SEN are three times more likely than children without any identified needs to be ‘persistently absent’ from school. The DfE have defined ‘persistently absent’ as being children who miss 15% or more of the school year.

Pupils without special educational needs

The current rate of non-attendance among children without special educational needs is 4.0%. That means that during the school year, the average number of days missed by a pupil without any identified additional needs is 7.6.

Again, in real-world numbers, that means that a child without SEN would spend an extra full school week in school as compared to a child with a Statement of SEN.

The report in March 2014 (at page 4) sets out that the non-attendance rate for children without any form of SEN was 4.8%. That means that that the rate of non-attendance has dropped by 0.4%. That is in comparison to a 1.6% change in children with a Statement of SEN.

What about children with SEN but without a Statement?

The overall average rate of non-attendance for all children in England now stands at 4.4%. That includes all children with SEN and without SEN. The report does lack some finesse. The only distinction that is specified is between children with a Statement of SEN and those without identified additional needs.

The report published in March 2014 does a little better in that it does confirm what the non-attendance rate was in special schools, however, of course, that will include children with both a Statement of SEN and those without a Statement but with additional needs.

As such, we cannot readily tell how children with SEN, but without a Statement of SEN, are doing.

So what does this all mean?

On the face of it, the amount of school time missed by children with a Statement of SEN is decreasing. It would also seem that children with a Statement of SEN are improving their school attendance faster than children without any form of SEN. That would appear to be good news.

However, it is clear that the most vulnerable pupils with a Statement of SEN who are persistently absent are not affected by this improvement. Children with a Statement are still three times more likely to be persistently absent than children without additional needs.  That has remained the same since 2012.

It would be interesting to know what additional support those particularly vulnerable children are receiving whilst not at school and whether their schools and/or local authorities are fully supporting them.