Useful links and glossary
- Warwickshire Family Information Service
- Warwickshire Schools Inclusion Charter
- Warwickshire Working Together Charter
- DfE Guidance - Working together to improve school attendance
- DfE Guidance - Mental health issues affecting a pupil's attendance: guidance for schools
- Children's Commissioner for England
Glossary
Attendance action plan – an informal agreement between you, your child if they are old enough to understand, their school and sometimes your local council about what actions supporting your child will take to improve their attendance.
Community order – an order that can be made by a Court after you have been found guilty of knowingly failing to secure your child’s regular attendance rather than sending you to prison. This may include requirements for you to take part in certain activities or observe certain rules.
Early help assessment – a voluntary assessment of what you and your family need help with to allow your child’s school and/or your local council to put the right support in place or help you access the right services.
Education supervision order – an order that can be made by the Family Court to require a local council to advise, assist, and direct you and your child so that they receive suitable full-time education. This is not a criminal conviction, but persistently breaching the council’s directions can lead to prosecution.
Leave of absence – permission given by your child’s school for them to be absent from school for a specified period of time. You should write to the head teacher and ask for a leave of absence before the time your child needs to be absent from school. They will only be agreed to in exceptional circumstances.
Parenting contract – a formal signed agreement between you, and your child’s school and/or your local council agreeing what actions you will take to improve your child’s attendance and what the school/council will do to support you in this.
Parenting order – an order that can be made by a Court after you have been found guilty of failing to secure your child’s regular attendance. You will be required to take part in certain activities or observe certain rules. Reasonable adjustment – a change made by your child’s school to remove or change something that is preventing your child from attending school.
Regular attendance – attending school every day that the school is open in line with the school rules apart from in a small number of allowable circumstances. School attendance support team – the team in your local council who can help you with your child’s attendance.
Special educational need (SEN) – Children and young people with SEN all have learning difficulties or disabilities that make it harder for them to learn than most children and young people of the same age. These children and young people may need extra or different help from that given to others.