Regular attendance is crucial to each child’s educational development and achievement and here, at The Venerable Bede, we recognise our part in assisting parents/carers to meet their legal obligations in this respect.

If your child is unable to attend school because of ill-health or for any other reason, please contact the school attendance officers in the first instance and, upon your child’s return to school, provide a letter of explanation to the form tutor. Our attendance officers, heads of year and form tutors will work with you to ensure that your child’s attendance at school is of the highest possible standard. Where there are repeated attendance issues, parents/carers and students are called before the school attendance panel of the governing body. This panel is run by school governors and is designed to investigate reasons why the student’s attendance is poor and to provide  further support. The attendance panel also has the duty of challenging absence where attendance has fallen below regional and national targets; it forms Stage 2 of the local authority’s five stage attendance procedure.

Students who arrive late for school must report to the attendance officer at the main entrance from 8.30am. After these times, students are requested to enter the school building by the main entrance and report to the school office to be registered. Any student who is late to morning or afternoon school will receive an automatic detention. Students, who have to leave school during the school day, must report to he school office to register their exit from the building. Students are issued with a pass by the office staff when they leave the building.