Nine schools and academy trusts will become “attendance hubs” under plans to expand a pilot scheme, while a mentoring programme aimed at tackling absence will be extended to four more areas of England.
The Department for Education has named seven academies and two alternative provision trusts that will between them support 600 schools to “improve their attendance by sharing effective practice and practical resources” (full list below).
And an attendance mentoring programme currently being trialled in Middlesbrough will be extended to Knowsley, Doncaster, Stoke-on-Trent and Salford, with an aim to work with 1,665 persistently and severely absent children.
Expansion of the two programmes form part of a government drive to improve attendance, which has stalled following the Covid-19 pandemic.
