Attendance

It is imperative that poor attendance is identified early on. If there are any emerging problems with school attendance, then the child’s social worker should seek to identify solutions via a professional dialogue between all key partners, e.g. foster parents, school, education welfare officer (EWO) & virtual school, as well as discussing any issues with the child themselves.

City of Wolverhampton Council’s policy on Promoting the Education of Children and Young People in care states:

Foster parents should not take children & young people in care out of school for holidays during term time.

Social care will not give authorisation for children’s holidays during term time, unless in very exceptional circumstances. If a foster parent feels that exceptional circumstances apply in such a case, they should submit a request to their child’s social worker, who will forward the request in writing to the Virtual School Head (VSH). As the authorising officer on behalf of the local authority, the VSH will consider the request and provide a written response to the social worker within 10 working days of receipt of the request. The VSH will discuss the request with the child’s school and other managers and arrive at a decision.

The Promoting the Education of Children and Young People in Care and Previously in Care policy is available here

All requests should be submitted to the local authority first, before contacting the child’s school. As a rule, however, holidays should not be taken in term time and only in exceptional circumstances will be agreed.

School Attendance