The latest data relates to the week commencing 09 September 2024 and is available in the pupil attendance dashboard (opens in a new tab). Data is collected on a daily basis and data for the interim weeks between publications is included in year-to-date figures and is available on a daily and weekly basis in the underlying data available on this page (see “Explore data and files”). The dashboard displays attendance and absence headline figures, and reasons for absence at national, regional and local authority geographic levels. Data is available across primary, secondary and special schools and can be broken down by individual school type.
The data shows that the attendance rate across the week for all schools was 95.2%, giving an overall absence rate of 4.8%. The absence rate varied across the week with a low of 4.5% on Wednesday, and a peak of 5.5% on Friday. The peak in absence on a Friday is in line with weekly patterns in historical attendance data.
Users should be aware of the following:
- Response rate - 96% of schools shared data in the most recent week, therefore national figures are estimates. Across school types this was: 96% of state-funded primary schools, 97% of state-funded secondary schools and 92% of state-funded special schools. This follows it becoming mandatory for schools to share attendance data with the DfE from the start of the 2024/25 academic year. This response rate is in line with the level of response seen at the end of the 2023/24 academic year (95%), therefore there is no discontinuity in the series. However, please note that the response rate was lower in the equivalent week at the start of the 2023/24 academic year (85%) therefore comparisons to this time point should be made with awareness of the difference in data coverage.
- Estimates for non-response - In recognition that response rates are not equal across school types and, therefore, not representative of the total school population, the total rates for all schools have been weighted based on the Spring 2024 school census.
- Reporting lag - Schools update their registers continually and attendance codes change, resulting in absence rates for particular days to decrease over time. Analysis of data from the Summer 2022 term suggests that this could be a decrease in the absence rate of around 1 percentage point before settling down. Historical figures from week 37 onwards will be recalculated in each publication.
From the start of the 2024/25 academic year, it became mandatory for schools to share attendance data (opens in a new tab) with the DfE. If you are a school that is not already sharing your daily attendance data, you need to approve this in your Wonde portal. This will also give you, your local authority and your multi-academy trust (if applicable) access to daily attendance reports (opens in a new tab) to help identify pupils needing attendance support earlier.