Absence Request Form

Please see attached form that parents must complete if requesting absence from School. 

Our attendance policy states: 

Generally, the DfE does not consider a need or desire for a holiday or other absence for the purpose of leisure and recreation to be an exceptional circumstance. Leave of absence should not be granted for a pupil to take part in protest activity during school hours. 

All absences associated with a holiday or other absence for the purpose of leisure and recreation during term time will be marked as unauthorised within the register. Any parents who remove their child from school for the sole purpose of a holiday or other absence for the purpose of leisure and recreation will be referred to the Local Authority and be issued with a fixed penalty notice fine or referred to the Local Authority to consider prosecution. 

We believe that children need to be in school for all sessions so that they can make the most progress possible. However, we do understand that there are times where a parent may legitimately request leave of absence for a child due to ‘exceptional circumstances.’

 At St Margaret’s CE Primary School, leave of absence is only granted at the discretion of the Headteacher and shall not be granted unless there are ‘exceptional circumstances.’   

Parents wishing to apply for leave of absence during term time must apply in writing to the Headteacher at least a month before the planned leave.

If a written request for leave of absence is not completed and the leave is taken without a request being submitted, the leave will not be considered by the Headteacher, and it will be marked as unauthorised. The school will treat each application individually and discuss with you the circumstances of the application before a decision is made. Retrospective requests will not be considered and therefore will result in the absence being categorised as unauthorised. The school has a “Request for Absence from Learning in School Time” form, which was created by the Angmering Locality Group Headteachers.  This is available from the school office and can be found at the bottom of this page.

A fixed penalty notice [FPN] request or a referral for prosecution may be submitted to the Local Authority should:

•  The parent fails to submit a leave of absence request in advance of taking the leave.
• An application for a leave of absence is not agreed by the Headteacher but is still taken.
• A longer period is taken more than the agreed number of days.