Essex support first toolkit

Good practice, guidance and supporting documents and letter templates

Moving to a more formal approach to addressing attendance concerns.

There is no obligation on the school or local authority to offer an attendance contract, and it may not be appropriate in every instance, but an attendance contract should always be explored before moving forward to a referral for legal intervention. Further information can be found on the DfE Statutory Working Together to Improve School Attendance document. 

• Essex Schools key information in developing a formal attendance contract (Word, 62KB)
• Attendance contract - invite to meeting communication (Word, 38KB)
• Confirmation of re-arranged date/time of attendance contract meeting communication (Word, 37KB)
• Essex attendance contract meeting pro-forma (Word, 53KB)
• Failure to attend attendance contract meeting communication (Word, 39KB)
• Failed attendance contract communication (Word, 37 KB)

Formal approach

A Notice to Improve is a final opportunity for a parent to engage in support and improve attendance. A Notice to Improve does not need to be issued in cases where support is not appropriate. What sufficient improvement looks like can be decided on a case by case basis taking the individual family's circumstances into account. 

For some families, no further absence will be appropriate, for others, some absence may be tolerable if considerable improvement is seen. Details of what sufficient improvement looks like for each case should be made clear in the Notice to Improve. Where it is clear that improvement is not being made, it may be appropriate to issue a Penalty Notice before the improvement period has ended. For example, a Notice to improve stated there should be no further authorised absences in a 6-week period, but the pupil is absent for unauthorised reasons in the first week. The parent should be informed before a Penalty Notice is issued if it is before the end of the improvement period. Further information can be found in the DfE Statutory Working Together to Improve School Attendance document. 

Where informal approaches have not worked, use the following templates:

• Essex schools and professionals guide to Notices to Improve (Word, 33KB)
• National threshold met - Notice to Improve (Word, 35KB)

Legal intervention for attendance

For further information or support about legal intervention, see our Attendance - Statutory Legal Interventions section.