Attendance and Punctuality
Attendance and Punctuality
Good attendance and punctuality are vitally important if your child is to make the most of the educational opportunities we offer.
For further information about school attendance please visit the Surrey County Council website: School Attendance and Absence.
Reporting Absence
If your child is unwell and unable to attend school, please notify the school office before 8.30am either via email, parent@oakfield.surrey.sch.uk or by calling the office on 01372 374 781 and leaving a message on our absence reporting line. Please contact us for each day of absence.
If your child is well enough to return to school but still requires medication during the day, including prescribed medicines, arrangements can be made for medicines to be stored in our first aid cupboard and administered by the school office team. Please contact the school office if at any point you need to put this arrangement into place.
School times: *
Registration 8:35am - 8:45am
Break 10:35am - 10:50am
Lunch 12:10am - 1:10pm
Afternoon session 1:10pm - 3:15pm
Children should arrive no earlier than 8.30am as there is no supervision prior to this time. Children can register in their classroom from 8.35am. Registers close at 8.45 am. If your child is late, please ensure they are brought in via the office so they are registered.
Parents are reminded not to book family holidays, long weekends away or treat days during term time as we will not authorise absence for these under any circumstance. We will only ever authorise absence for a funeral or an educational activity, e.g. participating in a sporting event, performance, taking music or dance exams, or other exceptional circumstances. If you have a planned absence from school please complete an Absence Request Form. A copy of this form can be downloaded from the foot of this page, or a copy can be requested from the school office.
Is your child’s attendance acceptable?
As a school we continue to encourage good, regular attendance from all pupils. Without regular attendance the efforts of the school staff and the individual pupil come to nothing. Irregular attendance undermines the educational process. This leads to underachievement, a lack of purpose in a child’s life; it can place children at risk and in extreme cases can result in pupils being drawn into patterns of anti social or criminal behaviour.
Did you know that of 365 days in a year, 190 days are school days and 175 are non-school days—that is nearly half of the entire number of days in the year! As a school we expect parents to use these 175 days for your family time, and for activities such as shopping, appointments, day trips and family holidays. While we appreciate it’s not always possible to take appointments on non-school days, we do ask that these are kept to a minimum.
We seek to keep our school attendance as close to 100% as possible. If a child has 10 school days off in a year their attendance falls to 95%, which is considered a level of attendance that is cause for concern.
If attendance falls to 85%, it would mean that a child has only received 161 days of education in the year, and has not been in school for over 200 days of the year.
Valuable learning happens every day in school, and any absences will impact on a child’s learning. The more absences a child experiences, the less continuity they have in their learning, and the harder it can be for them to learn. Every day in school matters.
Late for School? It all adds up!
Arriving at school on time is really important, so your child is settled, has unpacked their bag for the day and is ready to learn straight after morning registration. Did you know if a child is 5 minutes late every day, over a year this would mean they have missed 3 days worth of school? If your child is 30 minutes late for school every day, over a year this would add up to a whopping 19 days worth of school missed due to lateness!