The pandemic’s woeful impact on children has not run its course. While mental-health problems linger, old-fashioned approaches, such as fining parents of absent youngsters, are unlikely to work
Though covid is no longer closing schools or requiring pupils to self-isolate, many children are still missing from their desks. So far this school year more than one-fifth of pupils in England have been “persistently” absent, a label that applies when a youngster misses at least 10% of their classes.
Pupils miss school for a whole gamut of reasons. The easy assumption, of truanting children unchecked by lax parents, is only part of it. Youngsters with special educational needs have long missed more lessons than others; they comprise only 16% of pupils in England but make up one-quarter of persistent absentees. Bullying and chaotic home lives make it less likely that children will go to school.
Mental health has worsened, among children and parents alike. A survey carried out by the National Health Service last year concluded that one in six children aged 7-16 had a “probable mental disorder”, up from one in nine in 2017. Steve Bladon, a former primary-school head whose own daughter has developed anxieties that prevent her from attending school, says it is not realistic to think that youngsters can all simply “crack on as they used to”.
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