Region's schools top country's truancy league

Updated statistics from the Department of Children, Schools and Families showing how many half-days have been missed through authorised and unauthorised absence, confirm the region's secondary schools have the worst attendance records in England.

More than 1.4 million half-day sessions were missed by truants at Yorkshire's secondary schools in the autumn term of 2008 and spring term of 2009.

A further 615,910 half-days were missed through unauthorised absence in the region's primary schools.

There were 20,200 secondary school pupils from Yorkshire classed as persistent absentees – by missing at least a fifth of their education – the equivalent of a day a week.

In Hull, one in 10 secondary school pupils were persistently absent, the second-worst figure in the country behind Manchester.

Hull's council-run schools had the worst truancy rate in the country, with 4.18 per cent of half-days being lost through unauthorised absence.

Elsewhere in Yorkshire, Leeds had the second highest level of persistent absentees in the region with 8.5 per cent, followed by Sheffield with 7.4 per cent, Doncaster with 7.3 per

cent and Bradford with 7.1 per cent.

The results confirm provisional figures, which were published by the Government in October, which showed Yorkshire secondary schools continuing to suffer the highest truancy rates in the country.

Nationally authorised absence for primary and secondary schools from autumn 2008 to spring 2009 was at 5.28 per cent, down 0.01 per cent from 5.29 per cent from autumn 2007 to spring 2008.

Unauthorised absences were at 1.03 per cent compared with 0.97 per cent a year earlier.

The most commonly reported reason for pupil absence was illness followed by family holidays.