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Contents

1. Aims and Objectives
2. Roles and Responsibilities
3. Procedure
4. Reporting Procedure

1. Aims and Objectives

All children and young people should be attending school and it is the aim of the Lambeth Community College to work with the social care team, schools, Carers and the young people to ensure all LCC pupils have a school placement and attend school, or an alternative school placement if pupils have been excluded.

This policy will continue to outline the responsibilities of all personnel concerned with ensuring the pupils attend school. These personnel are:

• The Principal, the Deputy Principal, the Achievement Officer, the Attendance Officer of the Lambeth Community College
• The social workers and managers of the CYPS LAC teams
• The Headteacher and Designated teacher of the LAC pupils school
• The Head of Service for Children Looked After and Corporate Parenting
• The Assistant Director for Children Looked After and Corporate Parenting
• The Director for Social Care
• The carers and their fostering agency
• The children and young people
• The parent or person with parental responsibility for the child

2. Roles and Responsibilities

The Lambeth Community College will:

• Record and analyse the pupil absence each week through Welfare Call and inform the social care teams
• Short term absence, with a valid reason will be recorded
• Long term, persistent, or unauthorised absence (over 5 days) will be followed up through the college Attendance Officer. This will involve the Attendance Officer liasing with the social worker and school to support pupils to return to school, college or alternative provision. The role of the Attendance Officer will be the same as for any other school – to challenge non- attendance and ensure all LAC pupils attend school
• If the absence is persistent and the social care team are unable to resolve  the absence, the Attendance officer will work with the carer, social worker, the Designated Teacher, young person and carer to return the pupil to school
• The LCC personnel, including the Attendance Officer, will work with the social care team, carer and school to prevent pupils from permanent exclusion, or school disaffection
• If there is persistence absence, or fixed term exclusions, or school disaffection, a PEP or school meeting will be set up through the LCC to ensure strategies are in place to support the child or young person

The social care team will:

• Liaise with the foster carer to ascertain the reasons for the absence and forward this information to the college within five days of the reported absence
• Liaise with the foster carer to support the pupil to return to school
• Work with the attendance officer to support the pupil in returning to school
• Work with the school and young person to ensure a higher attendance rate

The Attendance Officer will:

• Work with the LCC Achievement Officer through the weekly welfare call system informing the LCC of the absence returns of pupils for the following week. On gaining this information the Achievement Officer and Attendance Officer will follow up on all pupils with 5 days absence or more with the allocated social worker to understand the absence and effect strategies to support the child to return to school and report to the Principal
• Work with the social workers, carers and schools to enable the LAC pupils to attend school in line with national attendance targets. This will involve home visits, meetings with the named social worker and meetings with the school to understand the nature of the absence and how this can be resolved
• Support the staff of the Lambeth Community College to enable pupils to raise LAC pupil attendance and monitor the attendance of LAC pupils. This will involve maintaining an on-going analysis of the pupils not attending school, setting up meetings between the LCC and social workers, schools and carers, working with the mentor in re-integrating pupils
• Support the LCC, the social care team, Carer and school if the pupil is in danger of fixed term or permanent exclusion through working as part of the team supporting pupil re-integration

The school will:

• Meet with the Attendance Officer to discuss and attempt to resolve the difficulties the pupil is experiencing in school
• Work with an Educational Adviser to ensure the pupil returns to school  or educational provision, or to find an alternative placement
• Work with the LCC Educational Adviser to avoid exclusions and long-term absence
• Meet with the carer, social worker, LCC Adviser, the pupil to work out a realistic plan for the pupil to attend
• Alert the social worker, LCC and carer if there is any danger of an exclusion during the PEP meeting

The Lambeth Community College will be responsible for recording pupil absences and the progress made in reducing absence levels for LAC pupils through feedback from social workers and the Attendance Officer.

Although the social care team are the corporate parents the LCC recognises that the college and social care teams will need to work together with schools and carers to reduce the absence levels of the looked after children.

3. Procedure

1. The Attendance Officer and Achievement Officer will collect and monitor the welfare call system for pupil absences
2. They will forward the data to the Principal and the team will decide which pupils to follow up (those absent over 3 days, persistent absentees)
3. The Attendance Officer will meet firstly with the named social worker to find out the reason for the absence, and how this absence can be resolved. This discussion should involve the carer. The carer, attendance officer and named social worker should agree a clear plan to enable the pupil to return to school. This should involve the views of the young person
4. If the absence is not resolved through the above, the attendance officer should make a visit to the school to ascertain why there is a persistent absence and draw up a plan  to support the pupil return to school
5. It may be that a further meeting will be necessary with a joint meeting between the carer, named social worker, school, young person, attendance officer and personnel from the LCC to assist the young person to return to school. A plan should be drawn up from this meeting and recorded in the form of a re-integration meeting
6. If the above points are not effective, a PEP should be called

4. Reporting Procedure

• The Attendance Officer of the LCC will be updated weekly by the named social worker on the reasons for LAC non-attendance and the action taken to resolve this situation. This will be reported to the Achievement Officer, who will inform the Principal This update will be a standing item on the agenda of the Principal’s monthly meeting with the Divisional Director for Social Care
• The Principal and or Deputy of the LCC will meet with the Heads of Service, Children Looked After on a monthly basis to review the levels of absence and the progress on reducing the absence levels
• The LCC will notify the Head of Service for Fostering and Adoption of any issues in relation to carers or residential providers failing to support the attendance of LAC children and young people attending school
• The LCC Principal will raise any concerns with the Designated Teacher or Head Teacher about the non-attendance of LAC children and young people as deemed to be appropriate
• Any concerns in regard to the LCC’s  performance in relation to this policy will be raised by the responsible Head of Service with the Principal of the LCC and escalated via the appropriate Assistant Director

End