Schools are turning to innovative techniques to entice children back into classrooms, as school leaders warn high levels of absence will become “generational” unless urgently addressed.
Therapy dogs, reward vouchers, wellbeing sessions, taxi rides and shepherd huts are being used by schools in England and Wales seeking to attract “anxious avoidant people” to attend regularly.
One of the most ambitious efforts is Mary Immaculate College on the outskirts of Cardiff, which this summer opened a £1.7 million facility, the Churchill Wellbeing Centre, with funding from Cardiff City Council.
“It has lamps and rugs, it's a beautiful open space. It doesn't look like a school,” said Nadia Yassien, who runs the school's pastoral support program within the center that works with 200 of the school's 900 students.
With no alternative provision sites available nearby, the center has become an essential place to help children Yassien calls “anxious avoiders” come for lessons.
“We know it is working. The students who had very low attendance arrive regularly, punctually and happy, and that is key because they are not going to learn if they hate the place.”
After a sharp drop in attendance post-Covid, Yassien said Mary Immaculate's rates were now above the national promedio for Welsh schools.
Part of the improvement is due to Teddy, the labradoodle who has become a school celebrity when he accompanies a therapist on her visits to the center.
“The kids love the dog; He does individual sessions with the students and they love it. They take Teddy for a walk and then talk to [the therapist] and tell her what's going on, and then she can talk to us and tell us if they need more support,” Yassien said.
England and Wales have seen attendance rates remain stubbornly lower than before the pandemic. The most recent statistics from England showed that 150,000 “seriously absent” children missed 50% or more of school sessions last year.
While schools have long used prizes for good attendance, some are now stepping up their efforts with weekly vouchers and prize draws.
Southmere Primary Academy in Bradford is offering a growing range of rewards, including £20 vouchers for classes with 100% attendance. Students with perfect records at the end of the year are entered into a drawing to win a new bicycle.
Last year, Ellesmere Park secondary school in Salford offered a week-long draw for £50 vouchers for pupils who arrived on time, an amount which rose to £80 on Friday, traditionally the worst day for attendance.
But school leaders say the most truant students need more than rewards.
Robert Bell, the head of Evolve at Sunderland for an alternative provision for students at the Consilium academy chain, starts each day with a 30-minute “ready to learn” period to discuss the wellbeing of each student.
“We know there are potential turbulences a student could have experienced and I don't want that to impact the rest of their day. Students may come in with anxieties that they need to talk about, and if they have those things hanging over them, then they're going to struggle,” Bell said.
The result has been a 79% improvement in attendance, but Bell believes the problem will not improve without talking more about mental health.
“Sometimes it is generational and parents have a diminished concept of what education is and the support that the educational system has. That's why we open our doors, three times a year, and have mental health professionals come, so that mom and dad, grandpa, grandma, sister and brother can sit next to them, the student and our teachers. Those are some of the most powerful days I've had in education,” Bell said.
Kevin Buchanan, the head of EdStart Schools, which runs independent alternative provision sites in Larger Manchester and Wirral, said it is serving students who have had no formal education for up to two years.
“We have certainly seen an increase in referrals from young people who have been out of education for a long period of time and we are also seeing an increase in referrals from students who have been home-schooled but are now returning to it.” the system,” Buchanan said.
EdStart's focus is to examine the barriers each child faces and plan to overcome them. In the case of one girl whose parents had difficulty getting her ready, staff called every day at 7:30 a.m. to check on her, and booked a taxi to pick her up at 8:15 a.m., until she settled into a routine.
“We will find that for some young people with poor attendance, they are the second or third generation. It's like, 'Well, my grandmother never went to school, my mom didn't go to school.' That's why we say attendance is not just a school-wide approach, it's a family-wide approach,” Buchanan said.
David Williams, head of inclusion at Park Academies Belief (TPAT) in Swindon, said he feared today's absences could also take hold. “It's a generational thing: if we have children who don't go to school, their children won't go either,” he said.
Frustrated by the lack of specialized support in the wake of the pandemic, TPAT opened its “solution school” for students. “It is based on personal knowledge of where a child's path could lead if we do not intervene bravely,” said Gemma Piper, executive director of TPAT.
One success has been the trust's use of two oak shepherd's huts, after Williams spotted one in a garden centre.
“I became more and more aware that we have kids who find it really difficult to walk through the door of a large, 1,500-student high school,” Williams said.
But the cabins have been a solution: “We have placed them next to the school doors and they were originally used to take children to school, they are warm and clean and do not look like a school.
“There are parents who have also had difficulties at school and are very anxious and who cannot be taken to the main building, but they can be taken to a shepherd's hut.”