AI attendance targets yet to reach many schools

More than one in four schools are yet to see an AI-generated attendance target that the Department for Education said “every” school was set last term, findings suggest.

The findings are further proof that the attendance target plan has been “botched”, a sector leader has warned.

In November the DfE announced that education secretary Bridget Phillipson had “set every school an individual minimum attendance improvement target” powered by artificial intelligence.

It said at the time that schools would receive these targets “from this month” as part of plans to “double down” on cutting school absence.

Days later, the DfE suspended the targets - called the Attendance Baseline Improvement Expectation (ABIE) - due to “data quality issues”.

It has now emerged that many schools are yet to receive an ABIE at all - and the DfE cannot clarify how many schools this applies to.

New survey data from Teacher Tapp, shared exclusively with Tes, indicates that nearly half of headteachers (48 per cent) have not, or do not know if they have, received their ABIE.

Teacher Tapp asked 536 headteachers in England if they had received their target as of February, and 52 per cent of respondents said they had, 29 per cent said they had not, and 19 per cent were unaware of it.

Responding to Tes, a spokesperson for the DfE said that “some schools may not have received one” but most should have.

They said: “Most schools should now have an Attendance Baseline Improvement Expectation and can access it through their similar schools report. This is available through the Monitor Your School Attendance Service.

“Schools may not have received one, for example if they are out of scope to receive a similar schools report as outlined in the user guide, such as a new school, a special AP school or a school which has recently changed trust.”

However, Tes understands that these categories do not apply to all of the schools left without an ABIE.

AI attendance targets ‘a botched exercise’

The DfE said that this was an “indicative year” during which it will refine its approach, and that it aims to provide all schools with an official ABIE in September.

Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said the rollout of AI attendance reports was a “botched exercise”.

“Some schools have received completely inappropriate AI targets, while others have seemingly received no target at all,” he said.

“This botched exercise has done nothing to instil confidence in the ability of the government to work effectively with AI in a way that is genuinely helpful for schools and colleges.”

After the AI targets were announced, heads warned Tes that they would have “very little” impact in reducing absence.

Three months after the launch, Teacher Tapp asked heads how important the AI targets are to improving attendance, to which nearly half (47 per cent) said they were “not at all” and just 2 per cent said they were “very important”.

Paul Whiteman, general secretary of the NAHT school leaders’ union, said: “These findings echo our clear position that these reports alone will not boost attendance.

“If the DfE insists on using them, their use should be optional to support schools in addressing their own identified attendance issues - they are no substitute for professional judgement.”

Mr Whiteman added that NAHT “remains concerned” about the reliability of using AI for the targets.

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