SPONSORED: ’Teachers are telling us the attendance crisis isn’t about behaviour. Are we listening?’

SPONSORED

The new Prime Minister and Education Secretary have moved quickly this summer, announcing new technical pathways for 14–16-year-olds and a stepping stone qualification for young people resitting GCSEs.

The urgency is clear. Too many young people, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, do not see school as a place that offers value to them or their families and so increased choice and new routes to qualifications matter. 

As does the commitment in the schools white paper to halve the GCSE disadvantage gap. This year, a third of young people did not gain vital English and maths GCSEs first time round, and around 80% of the 400,000 who resat did not pass either. Last academic year, 44% of pupils eligible for free school meals achieved a grade 4 in both English and maths, compared with 73% of their more advantaged peers.

We want the government to succeed but are concerned that reforms and school improvement efforts risk being fatally undermined by one thing: the attendance crisis. 

A crisis hidden inside the averages

Overall absence and persistent absence rates remain significantly above pre-pandemic levels, and severe absence continues to rise. These averages hide a deeper crisis for pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds, who are twice as likely to be absent, more than two-and-a-half times as likely to be persistently absent, and over three-and-a-half times as likely to be severely absent.

Early signs from this autumn term suggest that after some improvement, this gap is widening again. 

If young people are not in the classroom they cannot learn, this should worry ministers as much as what they are learning and how they are examined. And as research has shown the widening of the attainment gap post-Covid has been solely driven by the crisis in attendance, attendance is clearly an urgent problem that needs attention now. 

What teachers are telling us

Our new report with Public First, based on focus groups with 62 secondary school staff, explored how those delivering attendance policy experience it. What we heard should reframe how government thinks about this problem.

Teachers overwhelmingly told us they do not see the attendance crisis as one of behaviour. They see it as one of disengagement. As one teacher put it, missing a day is also a loss of friendship and belonging.

Schools worry most about pupils gradually losing connection: to routines, friendships and the adults who might notice them.

That distinction matters. A pupil disengaging from school needs something different from one testing boundaries. Fines and sanctions may have a role, but staff told us they can damage the trust schools need to rebuild.

We also found a sharp divide inside schools. Senior leaders and attendance leads often buy into the “every day matters” message, seeing attendance as the foundation for safeguarding, learning and life chances.

Classroom teachers were more sceptical, often viewing attendance chasing as an administrative burden competing with teaching. In some schools, this has become a genuine source of tension between staff and leadership.

Any national attendance strategy that assumes schools speak with one voice is starting from the wrong premise.

The support that works is the support we can’t sustain

School staff were clear about what works to improve attendance: trusted adults, relationships, belonging, flexible support, sustained work with families. But day to day, that work feels “relentless” and “exhausting.”

This is the system’s trap: the interventions staff trust most are hardest to scale because they require time, capacity and emotional energy that schools in disadvantaged communities are least resourced to give.

The research also points beyond the Department for Education. Staff described schools as the last line of defence against wider failures: long CAMHS waiting lists, threadbare family support and entrenched poverty. “We are the one stop shop for everything,” as one senior leader told us.

What government should do next

We welcome the direction the government has taken this summer: new attendance data tools that give schools pupil-level insight, individual school improvement targets, and trials of enrichment activity to rebuild engagement. These are the right instincts. Announcing the changes, Paul Waugh, Minister for Early Education, said the government’s response needed to be “broader, smarter and more ambitious.”

We agree – and our research points to three places that ambition needs to go further. The Department for Education should publish attendance data that shows where things are improving, where they’re beginning to deteriorate, and where pupils are at risk of becoming persistently or severely absent.

The system needs to put belonging and engagement at the centre of attendance strategy – real investment in trusted-adult and mentoring programmes, protected time for relationship-building, support through transition points, not just one enrichment day a week.

And we need a serious, sustained effort across government, employers and schools to help disadvantaged pupils see attendance as a genuine investment in their future, not an abstract obligation.

Looking toward solutions 

With the help of our expert panellists, our event at Labour Party Conference, in partnership with LabourList, What Teachers Are Telling Us: Listening and Learning in the Attendance Crisis, will dive deeper into these solutions – exploring how schools and government can move beyond compliance towards environments that work with teachers and pupils, not simply on them.

One thing is already clear: our current system is not working.

We need a new approach, incentivising innovation around attendance to develop solutions fit for the present moment. And most importantly, we need to listen to, and learn from, teachers in this attendance crisis – not as a problem to be managed, but as part of the solution.

Listening to, and learning from, teachers in the attendance crisis will be a panel held on Monday 28th September at Revolution Bar, Atlantic Pavilion, Albert Docks from 10:00 – 11:00. 

Subscribe here to our daily newsletter roundup of Labour news, analysis and comment– and follow us on TikTok, Bluesky, WhatsApp, X and Facebook. You can also write to our editor to share your thoughts on our stories and share your own. The best letters are published every Sunday.

• • SHARE: If you have anything to share that we should be looking into or publishing about this story – or any other topic involving Labour– contact us (strictly anonymously if you wish) at [email protected].
  • SUBSCRIBE: Sign up to LabourList’s morning email here for the best briefing on everything Labour, every weekday morning.
  • BECOME A FRIEND: If you enjoyed this, why not consider becoming a Friend of LabourList? Help sustain our journalism, and of course Friends do get benefits…
  • PARTNER: If you or your organisation might be interested in partnering with us on sponsored events or projects, email [email protected].
  • ADVERTISE: If your organisation would like to advertise or run sponsored pieces on LabourList‘s daily newsletter or website, contact our exclusive ad partners Total Politics at [email protected].