Truancy rates in England’s schools are at their highest since 1997, the latest figures show.An estimated 63,000 pupils truanted every day, equating to 1% of all school sessions missed without a valid reason.
This is also a rise of a quarter, or 0.21 of a percentage point, on comparable figures from last year which were 0.79%.
The government has written to local authorities urging them to keep up the pressure on persistent absenteeism.
I raise this as the evidence is that those who are out of school are at greater risk of harm from drugs and alcohol.
Here are the findings from Smoking, drinking and drug use amongst young people in England in 2006:
- Pupils who reported that they had ever been excluded from school were more than twice as likely as those who had not to be regular smokers. A similar relationship existed between truancy and regular smoking.
- Truancy was associated with recent drinking, but exclusion from school was not.
- Pupils who had truanted or been excluded from school in the past were more likely to say they took drugs at least once a month (11%) than those who had not truanted or been excluded (1%).
See also:
- The truth about truancy - Conor Ryan former Special Advisor to Tony Blair and David Blunkett discusses the figures and what works to reduce the numbers. He says:
there are clear signs that a programme of targeted intervention first ordered by Tony Blair two years ago to tackle persistent truancy in the 400 schools with the worst problem is having a real effect, with cuts of 20% in persistent absenteeism in those schools over the course of last year. (Academies have seen significant cuts too)
[...] on truancy figures caught my eye given that we know that children that truant from school are more likely to smoke, drink and take [...]