Event Summary

1 in 5* children in England are frequently missing from school, showing signs that schools are struggling with attendance. All children, regardless of their circumstances, are entitled to an efficient, full-time education which is suitable to their age, ability, aptitude and any special educational needs they may have.

Join Westminster Insight’s Children Missing Education Digital Conference to explore government policy and next steps to identify and safeguard children who go missing from school and support those unable to access education. Hear from sector leaders and best practice case studies from primary and secondary schools who are delivering results in their local areas.

How can you address the key challenges, such as persistent/severe absence that damage future prospects and lead to Children Missing Education? Tackle the underlying barriers to attendance and deliver tailored support to help vulnerable young people stay in education.

Understand how life outside of school can impact student engagement and gain practical takeaways to support students experiencing emotional based school avoidance. Hear from mental health and attendance experts to gain insight on how to create inclusive educational environments that meet the needs of all pupils.

Understand how data can be used to identify Children Missing from Education and best optimise targeted support for your most vulnerable students. We will explore how you can improve safeguarding practices and ensure effective multi-agency collaboration.

Our timely conference will explore the impact of the SEND and AP Improvement Plan on CME. We will share implementation ideas and strategies to improve identification and support for students with SEND and SEMH.

Finally we will look at multi-agency work to identify, find and re-engage children outside of the education system.

Wherever you are in your journey to help Children Missing Education, join this event to keep up to date and connect with peers who are working towards direct and long-lasting change.

*BBC News

Key Points

  • Delivering tailored support for children missing in education
  • Preventing CME: tackling persistent absence post pandemic
  • Engaging with vulnerable pupils and their families
  • Understanding complex home lives
  • Understanding and meeting different needs: SEND, AP and SEMH
  • Emotionally Based School Avoidance: improving mental health and wellbeing support
  • Improving data collection: identifying trends and patterns to break the cycle of CME
  • Best practice examples: working across primary, secondary and AP settings
  • Exploring how exclusion can be used as a trigger for intervention
  • Identifying and finding CME through multi-agency information sharing and notifications
  • Children outside of the bubble: working with vulnerable groups such as pupils in youth justice system, migrant families and Gypsy/Roma and Traveller families, young carers