There are many issues exercising headteachers as the new year gets going. The winter weather brings staff absence concerns; the Scottish government’s block grant is now with local authorities and beginning to impact staffing and budget formulae necessary to write next year’s timetables; and prelims and mid-session tracking bring a whole host of concerns, not least around the potential impact on predicted exam success.
But there remains a persistent worry pervading all these fresh concerns: how to resolve internal truancy, and the impact it has on school ethos, attendance, learning, teaching and attainment.
Truancy has always been an issue for schools. Attendance officers, deputes and guidance staff would set aside time to call home, visit home or walk around the locality seeking out those who had jumped the school fences.
These days, however, it seems our truants prefer the heated corridors over back paths: toilet cubicles hide vaping much more comfortably than the woods hide smoking.
Tackling internal truancy
Such is the desire for pupils to remain warm and indoors, but not in class, they now “lap” around the corridors, pursued to varying degrees of success by support staff, guidance teachers and deputes.
When apprehended and supported back into class, they then merely formulate another escape plan, “lapping” again until apprehended once more - hence internal truants are referred to more colloquially as “lappers”, a term used by both headteachers and, at times, education secretary Jenny Gilruth.
Many of these pupils also seem to derive a sense of gratification from the extra attention they get from fellow pupils or, indeed, the staff who are trying to support them back to class. They are happy to be centre stage in their own self-created drama.
Why has this phenomenon come about? And why has no school or education authority been able to enact a solution that even comes close to resolving it? What do we know about the demographics of these internal truants, these “lappers”?
From discussions with headteachers and across the many agencies represented in the cabinet secretary’s relationships and behaviour summit, it is clear there are various layers of truancy for us to tackle.
There remain those who attend school rarely, even at all, and those pupils have support plans and additional staffing and resources allocated centrally. These pupils, more often than not, have significant issues at home and have documented adverse childhood experiences and additional support needs that make clear why a traditional school curriculum is not working for them.
The next tier are those pupils who school management are aware have similar complex issues not yet acknowledged and supported centrally; issues that have more recently become a concern and where the system is yet to catch up. Added to these issues is the lack of resilience among some pupils, who refuse to go back to a class after as little as one incident where they found work challenging or had a minor disagreement with a classmate or teacher.
Next are pupils who have worked out that there are few sanctions available to schools to deal with “lapping” so long as they remain polite and courteous - a small price to pay for the freedom to roam and the option of not attending their least-favourite subjects.
Mental health and engagement
So, has any school cracked it? Mearns Castle High School has been recognised for its investment in targeted and universal support for pupils, requiring creative and personalised approaches to support mental health and engagement. The school was the first in Scotland to receive a gold-level School Mental Health Award, and the creation of its wellbeing base - The Hub - has been an important part of that work.
The Hub has dedicated staff (a principal teacher and wellbeing support assistants) who utilise cognitive behavioural therapy approaches to support pupils, enhancing resilience and managing some of the stresses and strains of life and school.
Many schools, having been to Mearns Castle for inspiration, have followed similar strategies. Others have opted for more traditional approaches for those pupils evidently not requiring individual support strategies: stringent record keeping of attendance, followed by calls home to parents, detentions and, when parents refuse to engage, exclusion.
With significant restrictions on headteachers excluding pupils, however, the demand for parents to come into school and take on their role as partners in education has intensified.
Some headteachers have decided that if pupils are caught out of class three times, despite support and having taken up a significant level of resource, then parents are to be summoned to school to engage with their child, given the parents’ legal responsibility to ensure that their child attends education.
‘Low-level behaviour crisis’
Almost every school in Scotland is now facing a low-level behaviour crisis, caused in large part - but not exclusively - by internal truancy and its impact on ethos and learning and teaching.
Consequently, the schools inspectorate has issued guidance to schools and local authorities saying that it will look to evaluate positive relationships in schools in an effort to understand local contexts. It will explore the support provided by local authorities and the views of pupils, staff, parents and partners, and it will review the record keeping necessary for schools to establish an effective strategy. It is looking for examples of highly effective practice to share across all schools.
Headteachers are already complaining of the added stress caused by this. They would have preferred that the Scottish government invest in additional staffing, a nationally agreed training strategy for support and pastoral staff and increased guidance around sanctions that schools can employ.
Post-Covid shift
Since Covid there has been a significant change in the mindset of many pupils, who are aware there are few sanctions of concern to them; from parents who have less desire to battle their children over attendance and from agencies who, quite rightly, champion those in distress but fail to recognise that often teenagers are teenagers and often just like to “skip” classes.
Above all else, Covid brought the realisation for many that education didn’t have to be confined to a single building from 9-4. And why, they ask, must they turn up for subjects they don’t want to do, just to fit a timetable?
Internal truancy will only be tackled through bespoke strategies. Some pupils require specialised staffing; some need tough love to return to class. A more tailored curriculum will also help, allowing them to attend school when necessary, either in person or online, and to engage with subjects they see as relevant to their needs and desires for life after school.
From discussions with colleagues, however, I would suggest that there are no clear answers to the problem of internal truancy.
Peter Bain is executive headteacher of Oban and Tiree schools (covering both the secondary and primary sector) and president of School Leaders Scotland
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