Week 35 2020

Attendance in education and early years settings during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic

Data guidance

Published

Data files

All data files associated with this releases are listed below with guidance on their content. To download any of these files, please visit our data catalogue.

Table 1 - Daily attendance in education settings during the COVID19 outbreak

Filename
table_1_daily_attendance_in_education_settings_during_covid19.csv
Geographic levels
National
Time period
2020 Week 13 to 2020 Week 29
Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
attending_nurseryChildren attending nursery
attending_receptionChildren attending reception
attending_year1Children attending year 1
attending_year10Children attending year 10
attending_year12Children attending year 12
attending_year6Children attending year 6
children_attendingChildren attending
children_critical_workers_attendingChildren of critical workers attending
children_with_ehcp_attendingChildren with an EHCP attending
children_with_ehcp_or_social_worker_attendingChildren with an EHCP or social worker attending
children_with_social_worker_attendingChildren with a social worker attending
dateDate
nonteaching_staff_attending_excluding_teaching_assistantsNon-teaching staff attending (excludes teaching assistants)
nonteaching_staff_attending_including_teaching_assistantsNon-teaching staff attending (includes teaching assistants)
open_settingsOpen settings
open_settings_to_nursery_reception_year1_or_year6Settings open to nursery reception year 1 or year 6
open_settings_to_year10_or_year12Settings open to year 10 or year 12
otherwise_vulnerable_children_attendingOtherwise vulnerable children attending
proportion_attending_nursery_open_settingsProportion of nursery children in open settings attending
proportion_attending_nursery_settingsProportion of nursery children attending
proportion_attending_receptionProportion of reception children attending
proportion_attending_reception_open_settingsProportion of reception children in open settings attending
proportion_attending_year1Proportion of year 1 children attending
proportion_attending_year1_open_settingsProportion of year 1 children in open settings attending
proportion_attending_year10Proportion of year 10 children attending
proportion_attending_year10_open_settingsProportion of year 10 children in open settings attending
proportion_attending_year12Proportion of year 12 children attending
proportion_attending_year12_open_settingsProportion of year 12 children in open settings attending
proportion_attending_year6Proportion of year 6 children attending
proportion_attending_year6_open_settingsProportion of year 6 children in open settings attending
proportion_children_attendingProportion of children attending
proportion_children_with_ehcp_or_social_worker_attendingProportion of children with an EHCP or social worker attending
proportion_of_settings_openProportion of settings open
proportion_of_settings_open_to_nursery_reception_year1_or_year6Proportion of settings usually accepting these year groups open to nursery reception year 1 or year 6
proportion_of_settings_open_to_year10_or_year12Proportion of settings usually accepting these year groups open to year 10 or year 12
response_rateResponse rate
teaching_staff_attending_excluding_teaching_assistantsTeaching staff attending (excludes teaching assistants)
teaching_staff_attending_including_teaching_assistantsTeaching staff attending (includes teaching assistants)
vulnerable_children_attendingVulnerable children attending
Footnotes
  1. Figures from Friday 27 March relate to data as at 4pm on each day, prior to this figures related to data as at 6pm. Negligible changes to the estimates were seen between 4pm and 6pm. Figures for Monday 1 June relate to data as at 3pm.
  2. Settings are asked to provide a count of the number of children of critical workers and the number of vulnerable children. Some children are classified as both a child of a critical worker and a vulnerable child. Some settings have been counting these pupils as children of critical workers, but not in the count of vulnerable children. Therefore, the number of vulnerable children is an under-estimate. We estimate the true figure is up to 5% higher.
  3. The following education settings are included: academies (including free schools and studio schools), local authority maintained schools (including local authority nursery schools), independent schools, non-maintained special schools, alternative provision, university technical colleges, FE colleges and sixth form colleges, and special post-16 institutions/specialist colleges.
  4. All figures are adjusted for non-response. This methodology was adjusted from Friday 27 March. See accompanying document for full methodology.
  5. The response rate for Friday 1 May was only 14% due to technical issues with DfE sign-in, the online system used by educational establishments to submit attendance data. This may have affected the accuracy of the figures. A lower response rate makes the methodology used to account for non-response slightly less reliable.
  6. From 1 June, the government asked schools to welcome back children in nursery, reception, year 1 and year 6, alongside children of critical workers and vulnerable children. As a result, changes were made to the survey of education settings to capture information about this wider group of attending pupils. From 15 June, secondary schools, sixth form and further education colleges were asked to begin providing face-to-face support to students in year 10 and 12 to supplement their learning from home, alongside full time provision for students from priority groups.
  7. From 23 March to 2 July the Autumn school census was used to determine year group population size. From 3 July, we switched to using the newly published Spring census. This change has the biggest impact on the proportion of nursery children in attendance. We estimate that this proportion falls by 5 percentage points when compared to using the Autumn census. Other year group attendance rates see a change of around 0.1 percentage points.
  8. The response rate between Monday 4 April and Friday 17 April was low because it was the Easter break for most settings in England. Similarly, the response rate between Monday 25 May and Friday 29 May was low because it was half term for most settings in England.
  9. Figures from Friday 27 March relate to data as at 4pm on each day, prior to this figures related to data as at 6pm. Negligible changes to the estimates were seen between 4pm and 6pm.
  10. The response rates for Wednesday 13 and Friday 15 May were impacted slightly due to technical issues which made it more difficult for some schools to complete the survey. A lower response rate makes the methodology used to account for non-response slightly less reliable.
  11. The following education settings are included: academies (including free schools and studio schools), local authority maintained schools (including local authority nursery schools), independent schools, non-maintained special schools and alternative provision.

Table 2- Daily attendance in responding education settings during the COVID19 outbreak not nationally

Filename
table_2_daily_attendance_in_responding_education_settings_during_the_covid19_outbreak_not_nationally_representative.csv
Geographic levels
National
Time period
2020 Week 23 to 2021 Week 20
Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
dateDate
open_responding_settings_not_nationally_representativeOpen responding settings (not nationally representative)
open_responding_settings_to_nursery_reception_year1_or_year6_not_nationally_representativeSettings open to nursery reception year 1 or year 6 (not nationally representative)
open_responding_settings_to_year10_or_year12_not_nationally_representativeSettings open to year 10 or year 12 (not nationally representative)
proportion_of_responding_settings_open_not_nationally_representativeProportion of responding settings open (not nationally representative)
proportion_of_responding_settings_open_to_nursery_reception_year1_or_year6_not_nationally_representativeProportion of settings usually accepting these year groups open to nursery reception year 1 or year 6 (not nationally representative)
proportion_of_responding_settings_open_to_year10_or_year12_not_nationally_representativeProportion of settings usually accepting these year groups open to year 10 or year 12 (not nationally representative)
response_rateResponse rate
Footnotes
  1. Figures from Friday 27 March relate to data as at 4pm on each day, prior to this figures related to data as at 6pm. Negligible changes to the estimates were seen between 4pm and 6pm. Figures for Monday 1 June relate to data as at 3pm.
  2. The following education settings are included: academies (including free schools and studio schools), local authority maintained schools (including local authority nursery schools), independent schools, non-maintained special schools, alternative provision, university technical colleges, FE colleges and sixth form colleges, and special post-16 institutions/specialist colleges.
  3. These figures are included for methodological completeness and show the corresponding data before it has been adjusted for non-response.
  4. Figures from Friday 27 March relate to data as at 4pm on each day, prior to this figures related to data as at 6pm. Negligible changes to the estimates were seen between 4pm and 6pm.

Table 3 - Daily attendance in early years settings during the COVID19 outbreak

Filename
table_3_daily_attendance_in_early_years_settings_during_the_covid19_outbreak.csv
Geographic levels
National
Time period
2020 Week 16 to 2020 Week 35
Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
Children_attendingNumber of children attending
Children_of_critical_workers_attendingChildren of critical workers attending
Closed_settingsNumber of closed settings
dateDate
Open_settingsNumber of open settings
Proportion_of_settings_closedProportion of settings closed
Proportion_of_settings_openProportion of settings open
Proportion_of_settings_with_unknown_statusProportion of settings with unknown status
Settings_with_unknown_statusNumber of settings with unknown status
Vulnerable_children_attendingNumber of vulnerable children attending
Footnotes
  1. The summer term had ended in most schools by Friday 17 July. Ordinarily, fewer early years settings are open and fewer children are in attendance during school summer holidays. This is due to reduced demand for childcare and the closure of school-based settings.
  2. From 1 June, the government asked early years settings to begin welcoming back all children in addition to those of critical workers and vulnerable children. The methodology to adjust figures for non-response was also updated to reflect this change.
  3. From 16 April to 18 June, the local authority early years survey was twice-weekly (Mondays and Thursdays). From 25 June, the survey changed to weekly (Thursdays).
  4. Thursday 28 May would usually have been half term, and some settings, particularly those that are school-based, will have been closed. This may also have reduced demand for childcare.
  5. All figures are adjusted for non-response. See accompanying document for full methodology.
  6. Settings are asked to provide a count of the number of children of critical workers and the number of vulnerable children. For the total, it is assumed that in the early years data there is no overlap between the number of children of critical workers and the number of vulnerable children.
  7. The following early years settings are included: group-based providers (Ofsted-registered nurseries and pre-schools), school-based providers (any pre-school provision run by school governing bodies, nursery classes in schools and maintained nursery school provision) and Ofsted-registered childminders.