Page 15 - Thorns Primary Prospectus 2017

Education Investigation Service (EIS)
All Parents are responsible for ensuring that their children of compulsory school age receive a
suitable full-time education.
The Education Investigation Service is responsible for ensuring that parents meet their legal
obligations in respect of their child’s education and to identify levels of support that a family
may need in assisting them to ensure that their child receives a suitable education. The Head
Teacher and Governing body of each school have the responsibility to inform EIS when a
child’s attendance becomes a matter of concern and to support the EIS in the actions that
they may take.

When it is found that parents fail to meet their responsibilities, the EIS has the legal power to
put interventions in place to promote better school attendance and behaviour. This could be
in the form of a warning notice, parenting contract, parenting order or penalty notice, further
information about this can be found in our attendance policy.

FIXED PENALTY NOTICES, (FPN’S)

Penalty Notices are imposed upon Parents and are fines of £60 if paid within 21 days of
receipt rising to £120 if paid after 21 days but within 28 days. The Parents can only be
prosecuted if 28 days have expired and full payment has not been made. There is no right of
appeal by Parents against the Penalty Notices. They are an alternative to the prosecution of
Parents.

Dudley’s LA’s Code of conduct states that Penalty Notices can be issued where a pupil’s
absence has not been authorised by the school. This includes: a number of unauthorised
absences, within a rolling academic year; one-off instances of irregular attendance such as
Leave of Absence taken during term time without the school’s permission; and where an
excluded pupil is found in a public place during school hours.

Leave of Absence shall not be granted unless: (a) an application is made in advance to the
School, and (b) the Head Teacher considers the request to have exceptional circumstances
relating to that application. If Leave of Absence is taken after the Head Teacher has
considered it and deemed it NOT to be for exceptional circumstances, or you do not make an
application in advance, then the absence will be recorded as unauthorised absence and may
be referred to the Education Investigation Service for the consideration of a Penalty Notice.

Penalty Notices may also be issued where Parents allow their child to be present in a public
place without reasonable justification during the first five days of a fixed period or permanent
exclusion. The Parents will be notified by the school at the time of the exclusion of this and
the days to which it applies.

For more information please go to http://www.dudley.gov.uk/resident/learning-
school/parental-support/dudley-education-investigation-service/
Groupcall
To help improve our communication with parents we use a service called Groupcall, which is
used by schools across the UK to communicate with parents, mainly by text message.
Groupcall will be beneficial to you because:
• Messages will get to you reliably
• We can send messages directly to mums and dads at the same time
• You will quickly know about important or urgent messages
• We can tell you more about what’s going on at the school

IT IS ESSENTIAL THAT YOU NOTIFY US OF ANY CHANGES TO YOUR CONTACT
DETAILS TO ENSURE WE CAN MAINTAIN COMMUNICATION AT ALL TIMES

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