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February 4 marked last day of school for severely absent students

Attendance Vulnerable children
Tuesday, February 4, was the last day of the school year for 158,000 children and young people who are classified as severely absent.
Missing education: Within primary schools, 0.8% of students are severely absent, meaning they miss 50% of their lessons – this is an increase from 0.4% in 2018/19 - Adobe Stock

The date has been designated School Attendance Gap Day as part of a new campaign launched by the charity School-Home Support.

Severely absent students are those who miss at least 50% of their school sessions, meaning February 4 – the halfway point of the academic year – is their de facto last day of school.

The most recent official data on severe absence (DfE, 2024) shows that 2.1% of students across primary, secondary and special schools are severely absent, equating to 158,000 (as measured over the autumn 2023 and spring 2024 terms). This figure is up from 0.8% in 2018/19 (around 60,000 students).

Within secondary schools, 3.5% are severely absent, an increase from 1.2% in 2018/19. And within primary schools, 0.8% of pupils are severely absent (up from 0.4%).

Latest attendance figures show that for the autumn term 2024, persistent absence – students who miss 10% or more of school sessions – stands at 19.2% (22.7% for secondary and 15.8% for primary schools), a marginal improvement on autumn 2023 (DfE, 2025).

School-Home Support is reminding the government that the number of children missing at least half of their schooling is 149% higher than pre-pandemic (2018/19) and that almost 1 in 5 students are still persistently absent.

To support its campaign, the charity has launched a school attendance calculator that calculates the de facto final day of school for a child depending on their attendance. For example, a persistently absent child who misses 20% of their school sessions will effectively finish their school year on May 20 while those missing 10% will finish on June 24.

The charity’s campaign points to research data showing that free schoool meals children are 3.56 times more likely to be severely absent than non-eligible peers.

Children who are severely absent are also five times more likely to be permanently excluded, and only around 5% of these students will achieve at least five GCSEs including English and maths.

School-Home Support says that anecdotal reports from its practitioners indicate that issues relating to home, money, and employment are the most pressing problems for families receiving support for their children’s attendance.

The charity now intends to mark School Attendance Gap Day each year in a bid to “promote positive collaboration to build an inclusive education system so we can tackle absence”.

Among its campaign aims, it wants to see more support for families and fewer fines. Jaine Stannard, CEO of School-Home Support CEO said: “The aim of School Attendance Gap Day is to highlight the importance of collective action to improve school attendance. The school attendance crisis isn’t going away, despite huge efforts by schools. We need to go further and faster to help families get the support they need so their children don’t miss out.

“As a charity, we know our holistic, whole family approach to tackling absence works with those we reach, but there are so many more families who need support with attendance. We are working with schools to share best techniques in supporting families with absence but we need radical collaboration across society to close the School Attendance Gap.”

School-Home Support practitioners are based in schools or the community and provide bespoke whole family support to tackle barriers to low attendance. The charity also runs an Attendance Support and Development Programme, aimed at supporting school staff with attendance responsibilities.