NI pupils topping truancy league

Fewer pupils are legitimately absent in Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland is top of the form for truant children, according to the latest Department of Education figures.

Schoolchildren played truant for 1,330,148 half-day sessions last year, which is higher than anywhere else in the United Kingdom.

Year 11 and 12 students were the most likely to duck out of class.

On top of lessons skipped without permission, nearly 3m half days were also missed for authorised reasons, such as sickness and bereavement.

However, more than 60,000 permitted absenteeisms were as a result of pupils serving school suspensions.

The 4.2 million total of missed half days accounts for 7.7% of the 55 million sessions all post-primary students could've attended in 2006/07.

While the percentage of all absenteeism is less than any region of the UK (England 7.9%, Wales 93% and Scotland 9.4) the 2.4% rate of unauthorised missed classes is the highest (England 1.5%, Wales 1.8% and Scotland 2.0%)

The Western Education and Library board area had the highest rate of half days missed without permission at 2.7%.

A spokesman from the Department of Education said the data would enable targets to be set to improve attendance levels in Northern Ireland.

"This exercise has provided our first indicators about our schools' performance in promoting attendance here," he said.

"The department is pleased to note that this data reveals that current overall absence here is lower than that of our counterparts in England, Wales and Scotland.

Guidance

"The department looks forward to seeing more detailed and widespread data from across all our schools following the school census exercise in October. This will help inform the setting of targets to improve attendance.

"Once targets have been developed, the department will issue guidance to schools on how best to promote regular attendance and on approaches to early and effective intervention."

He said pupils with consistently poor attendance records were already referred to the Education and Welfare Service for appropriate action.