NEU comments on latest School Attendance statistics

The school attendance figures for last week show a shocking increase in the disruption coronavirus is causing to our schools.

Almost two thirds of secondary schools had pupils self-isolating, up from 38% the week before. And the proportion of primary schools doubled from 11% to 22%.

More than 600,000 pupils did not attend school for coronavirus related reasons and 1 in 6 secondary pupils were not in school last week.

Yet again the Government has failed to publish the figures for the number of staff self-isolating.

Commenting on the latest attendance figures, Kevin Courtney, Joint General Secretary of the National Education Union, said:

“The Government squandered the opportunity to get the level of coronavirus infection down in schools by including them in a circuit breaker. They have failed to make testing available quickly enough, done nothing to reduce class sizes to reduce transmission networks and not even begun to prepare for the possible introduction of school rotas. Schools and families are now having to deal with the reality of rapidly increasing disruption in schools as coronavirus infection spreads through the school population.”