Ofsted wants GPs and pharmacies to help schools combat an “overly risk-averse approach” from parents to “keeping children out of school” amid stubbornly-high absence rates.
The watchdog told the Education Committee’s persistent absence and support for disadvantaged pupils inquiry that schools were still facing many of the “new challenges” to attendance following the pandemic.
This included a “propensity” among parents “to keep children home for any illness”, as well as keeping children off school “unnecessarily because of proximity to Covid”.
“These factors…have blurred the boundary of what level of intervention is needed for absence,” Ofsted said in evidence submitted in February and published on Tuesday.
