Attendance Checklist

A checklist for school leaders who want to get on top of attendance. It is written for schools in England, against the DfE's Working together to improve school attendance guidance and Ofsted's published insights, and helps you spot problems early and plan what to do about them.

Which guidance it reflects

• Written against Working together to improve school attendance, the edition that became statutory on 19 August 2024. Schools, academy trusts and governing bodies must have regard to it.
• DfE published a revised edition in July 2026. Its paragraph 5 lists the clarifications: taking the register at the same time for all pupils, benchmarking and young carers in data analysis, illness-related absence and when medical evidence may be appropriate, no blanket leave of absence policies, and when to use codes such as Q, D, Y6 and U. The checklist predates these, so check those points against the July 2026 edition.

Where each topic sits in the July 2026 edition

• Barriers to attendance and working with families: chapter 2, paragraphs 15 to 22
• Whole-school culture and the attendance policy, including telling parents about it each year: paragraphs 23 to 28
• Analysing data, weekly, half-termly and termly, by pupil, cohort and year group: paragraphs 44 to 46
• Sharing information with the local authority and partners, and daily attendance data for DfE: paragraphs 47 to 53
• Pupils absent through physical or mental ill health or SEND: paragraphs 54 to 64
• Persistent absence (10% or more) and severe absence (50% or more), and when severe absence may be neglect: chapter 5, paragraphs 134 to 137

Who it is for and when to use it

For the senior attendance champion on the leadership team (paragraph 13), headteachers and the governors who review attendance data (chapter 3). Use it when you review the attendance policy, and alongside each half-termly and termly data review.

What's inside

• Monitoring and analysing attendance data, including patterns of absence among pupils and groups of pupils
• Identifying barriers to attendance
• Putting strategies in place to improve attendance
• Communication with pupils, parents and staff
• Safeguarding considerations

Format: editable Word document, 6 pages. Approximate time saved: 12 hours.

Further reading: our summary of the DfE's Working together to improve school attendance guidance.

Part of the HeadteacherChat community library. Members get this resource, the full topic pack it belongs to and every update when guidance changes, alongside live sessions and more than 1,400 fellow school leaders. Join the community.