If your son or daughter is unwell, please contact the school by 9.30am by either telephone or email as follows:

Tel: 01753 515560
Email: ­Absence@arbourvaleschool.org

If we have not received a message by this time, the school will then contact you by phone to see why your child  absent.  If we are unable to make contact, the school may request a home visit.

We fully understand that many of our children and young people have complex medical conditions which mean they cannot come to school because they are too poorly and we are sensitive to this.  We know that even the healthiest of children can become ill.  However, we really want your children to come to school to enable them to achieve and make the best possible progress and if we feel that their attendance could be improved, we will seek to work with you and offer support to help their attendance improve.

Please note that we do operate the 48 hour rule with regards to sickness and diarrhoea.  If your son or daughter has sickness or diarrhoea, they must not return to school until 48 hours after the last time they have had an episode of either sickness or diarrhoea even if they seem better in themselves.  This is to reduce widespread infection and is the advice from Public Health England.

Medical Appointments

We also understand that many of our children have lots of medical appointments and that these will often be in school time.  When this is the case, please can you make sure that they are absent only for the time the appointment takes?  For example, if the appointment is at 10:00am, then they could come back to school afterwards, or if the appointment was at 2:00pm, then he or she could be collected after lunch.  We understand that not all appointments are in local hospitals and that this may not always be possible.  Equally, your child may be undergoing some treatment which would make coming back to school impossible.

Where possible, medical evidence must be supplied to the school ie. a copy of the appointment letter.

For our Attendance policy, please refer to our Policies page under the Key Information tab.