Legal Intervention – Useful documents and training for schools

Guidance from Essex Attendance Compliance Team – Pre-Referral Considerations

This document (Word, 36KB) has been produced for Essex schools to help them to understand the pre-referral considerations that they should make when seeking to evidence a clear “support first” approach. The “Working together to improve school attendance” statutory guidance, which came into force on 19 August 2024, makes clear that legal action should only be used in school attendance matters as a last resort, after all “support first” options have been exhausted and only where it is felt that legal action will make a difference. The document also sets out all of the information which referrers will need to have to hand, BEFORE they make a referral to the Attendance Compliance Team.  We strongly encourage colleagues to familiarise themselves with the content of the guidance and to use the advice to inform their practice when seeking to improve the school attendance of individual pupils. 
 

• Schools and Professionals Guide to Developing a formal attendance contract 
• Essex Attendance Contract template 
• Notice to Improve template 
• Slides from the Legal Intervention Training Webinar which was delivered to colleagues on Monday 1 July 2024 by the Attendance Compliance Team 
• Recorded version of the Legal Intervention Training webinar – for colleagues who missed/were not able to attend the live session on Monday 1 July 2024 - Attendance, Statutory Legal Intervention - Essex County Council (youtube.com)

Communicating attendance information to families - key information

• Essex requirements when communicating attendance information to families - advice for Essex Schools - September 2024 (Word, 26KB)
• Helping parents and schools understand the national threshold for penalty notice fines and prosecution for school attendance (Word, 40KB)