How much time is your child spending away from school ?

Schools are obligated by the Ministry of Education to monitor and report on student absences. It is a legal obligation for all children over the age of 6 years to be enrolled at a school, and once they are there, to attend regularly. The Ministry of Education defines regular attendance at 90% or more. That means if a child has more than five days absent in a term - he/she will fall below regular attendance.

To help our students access all opportunities and to be able to reach their potential, regular attendance at school is essential - and a legal obligation. 

Although we understand and appreciate that learning happens through all aspects of a child's life - not just when they are at school, significant time away from school has a negative affect on the growth and progress of a child. Not just progress in academics, but also in their social and emotional development. 

There are times in a student's learning journey that they may need to be away from school for a period of time - usually for medically related reasons. We understand this and will work with families to support where we can to keep children learning and feeling engaged with their classmates. There are also times where other barriers to getting children to school may arise - we are certainly not here to make things more difficult - but we always have the child's best interests and future prospects in our minds. This means that we will reach out to you and see how we can support your family through these times. We truly believe that it takes a village to raise a child and we want to work with our community for the best outcomes for all. 

In supporting our learners, we plan to raise awareness in our community of attendance and investigating ways that we may be able to help improve irregular attendance. We will do this in the first instance by celebrating all the many learners who are attending school regularly. This deserves to be celebrated! In line with our Student Attendance policy, we will continue to regularly check on attendance levels of our students. If we're noticing trends, our first step will be to get in touch and see if there is any way that we can help. Our processes and school requirements can be found by reading our policy document here: Student Attendance (username: silverdale password: whanau).

More information on attendance can be found by visiting the Ministry of Education website by clicking here.