Regular school attendance is vital, when it comes to empowering primary schools to do what they do best.
But whether it be due to unauthorised term-time holidays, children going missing from education, or unavoidable issues like illnesses, our nationwide attendance rates could be better. The Government’s latest absence and attendance figures, covering the full 2023/24 school year, show that the overall absence rate - the percentage of half-days missed for all pupils - sits at a lofty 7.1%, well above pre-pandemic figures. One in five pupils were also ‘persistently absent’, meaning they missed at least 10% of these half-day sessions.
A recent Department for Education report has highlighted just how disruptive these absences can be to a young person’s education, even during their early schooling. It found that pupils who attended class nearly every day in Year 6 were 1.3 times more likely to meet the Government’s expected standards in reading, writing and maths compared to pupils who only attended 90-95% of the time. This means missing just 10 days of school cuts their chances by around 25%.
With more than 140 primary schools in the Liverpool City Council area alone, we’ve taken a look at how they fared when it came to pupils missing class for any reason over the last school year. We’ve used this data to create a league table celebrating the local schools that kept their absence rates at 4% or lower - a fantastic achievement for any school community.
Here are the 13 that made the cut:
1. Our Lady's Bishop Eton Catholic Primary School
At the top of the list is this local authority-maintained Catholic primary school in the Mossley Hill area. It has a roll size of about 421, with a considerably higher proportion of pupils meeting the Government’s expected standards in reading, writing, and maths than both the local and national averages. In the 2023/24 school year, it had a low overall absence rate of just 3%. | Google
2. Bishop Martin Church of England Primary School, Woolton
Bishop Martin is an Anglican primary academy in Woolton. It has a roll size of about 207, and again, a very high percentage of pupils meeting official performance targets. In the 2023/24 school year, it had an overall absence rate of 3.3%. | Google
3. Whitefield Primary School
This is a local authority-maintained primary school in the Everton area, another above average academic performer with about 328 pupils. In the 2023/24 school year, it had an overall absence rate of 3.6%. | Google
4. Dovedale Community Primary School
Dovedale is another local authority-maintained primary school in the Mossley Hill area. A larger school, it has a roll size of about 835 pupils, and boasts a higher-than-average rate of them meeting reading, writing, and maths targets. In the 2023/24 school year, it had an overall absence rate of 3.7%. | Google