Absences

Attendance

Attendance at school is compulsory under New Zealand law and absences should be avoided if at all possible.

Obviously, there are valid reasons for an absence, such as sickness, bereavement and appointments.

There is a trend in New Zealand for families to take holidays in times other than school vacation periods. While there are various, quite understandable reasons for doing this, these absences do occur during valuable learning and teaching time, often making assessments difficult or unable to be completed.

If a child misses the valuable learning of new concepts in core learning areas such as Numeracy and Literacy and does not have the opportunity to practice the learning, he/she can have quite a gap, which may not be detected until some time later.

Regular attendance at school is vital if your child is to maintain a satisfactory rate of learning.

It is very important that the children arrive at school on time, ready for the school day. When a child arrives late, it is disruptive for the class, unsettles the child, it is discourteous to the teacher and can form a bad habit for the child.

Late Arrival

Students arriving late should be signed in at the office by the person dropping them at school.

Advising Absences

Teachers need to be advised why a child is absent or late for school.

Parents are advised that it is essential that they Report an absence via the website, school app or telephone before 9 am.

The school accounts for every child’s attendance or absence each day and families will be contacted if there is an unexplained absence. Likewise, if a child has a medical/dental appointment during school hours, the school office and/or teacher is to be advised beforehand.