Big problems call for ambitious goals. In the face of the climate change crisis, the ‘net zero by 2050’ goal keeps climate change at the front of our minds and inspires collective action. Meanwhile, the agreed milestones and targets along the way guide the country towards a decarbonised economy. Could the same approach work for attendance?
The impact of the pandemic continues to be felt even four years on, with almost one in five children still missing a significant amount of their education. Like the net zero ambition, the education system needs one moonshot goal that brings partners together and inspires collaboration to fix our education system.
Despite enormous effort from schools and local authorities, we are struggling to move the needle on high absence. Commitments on breakfast clubs and mental health support are a strong start, but they only benefit the child who is already in school and miss the chance to engage and build trust with parents and life beyond the school gate.
The attendance crisis is not a numbers game; it symbolises our collective failure to address complex and overlapping challenges that many families face in today. Schools are at the sharp end, but they cannot tackle high absence alone.
The thousands of children and their families that charities such as ours support are facing poverty, poor mental health and insecure housing, all which present a barrier to good school attendance.
The last government’s guidance made attendance everyone’s business and mandated a support-first, family-centric approach to absence. It was a step in the right direction, but broadly speaking, its budgets and solutions failed to match the scale of the crisis.
That is why we are calling on the new government to commit to a ‘moonshot’ goal to see every child in school and ready to learn by 2050. Not because the sector needs a new gimmick to kick the hard stuff into the long grass, but because it could be the way to bring needed focus, resources and reform to build a more inclusive system.
Alongside our aspirational goal, today we are publishing a plan to begin to achieve it. We have laid out ten policy recommendations for the first hundred days, first year and first five years for the new government to move the country towards a more inclusive education system. Here are just a few of them:
Supported and engaged families
Complex barriers to attendance must be understood and addressed, and parents engaged with their child’s learning. Labour’s first budget should commit to funding a whole-family support worker for every school.
Dedicated professionals working with the whole family will improve parental engagement, resources and skills as well as extra days in school. This is the secret to lasting improvement.
Supported and supportive schools
Ofsted should be reformed to encourage and reward schools for best practice with families. The attendance guidance set to become statutory next month makes attendance everyone’s business but will only work if there is adequate funding to deliver on the goal.
The implementation and effectiveness of the guidance, including the ‘targeting support meetings’, should be reviewed by next autumn.
Collaborative and preventative local services
Key services that schools rely on like SEND and CAMHS should be funded to meet demand. In the long term, we need to put the early back into ‘early help’, making it a statutory duty to protect funding. In the meantime, we can start by aligning thresholds so time isn’t lost when schools refer families for help.
By setting a moonshot goal to see every child in school and ready to learn by 2050, the government could galvanise efforts and inspire collaboration across departments and local authorities to tackle the biggest challenge facing our education system today.
Just like the net-zero goal for climate change, getting every child in school and ready to learn needs radical collaboration and laser focus on the underlying causes of the issue. We need to come together to give every child the education they deserve.
Read School-Home Support’s plan for full attendance by 2050 here
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