Poor school attendance can have a lasting impact on young people’s lives.
That is the message behind the States’ new ‘Attendance Matters’ campaign, which aims to tackle the rise in absences seen since the pandemic.
But while some pupils skip school because they simply do not want to be there, others miss lessons because of illness, anxiety, bullying, or struggles that can be invisible to everyone around them.
For civil servant Niamh (28), not her real name, missing school was never a choice.
Niamh was diagnosed with epilepsy when she was 11, so spent years in and out of hospital, missing lessons for weeks or months at a time.
“I definitely wish I could have been in school more.
“Obviously, there was nothing that I could have done,” she told Express.
‘I missed out on making friends’
The former St Sampson’s High student said her attendance problems were caused by severe epilepsy, not an unwillingness to learn.
She spent long periods receiving treatment, while her teachers adapted lessons and provided extra support to help her keep up.
“There were weeks when I was having almost 100 seizures a week,” she said.
“My Head of Year was a saint – my Teaching Assistants were amazing.”
Although she eventually achieved GCSE passes in English and Maths, she believes missing so much school affected more than her grades.
“Not being able to spend time with people, that’s the other thing. I didn’t get to make many friends,” she said.
She said the lack of day-to-day interaction with classmates contributed to anxiety and left her feeling she had missed out on developing important social skills.
Outside pupils’ control
Although she supports efforts to improve attendance, Niamh said schools also need to recognise when absences are outside a pupil’s control.
Referring to a recent controversy over pupils being excluded from prom because of low attendance, she said she would have been devastated had the same rule applied to her.
“If that was the general rule, I wouldn’t have been able to go to prom,” she said.
“When you’ve already missed out on so much as well, I feel like a punishment for attendance isn’t fair.”
‘Being in the building was enough’
Now working as a civil servant, Niamh said she continues to deal with some of the long-term effects of epilepsy, but has been supported by colleagues and managers.
“My line manager, my director and my colleagues are all great,” she said, adding: “They’re all just so accommodating.”
Looking back, she believes attendance remained important, even if she could not always be there.
“I think it’s important that I attended what I did and what I could,” she said.
“Even being in the building was enough.”
‘I thought I’d screwed it all up’
Jordan Bowring’s attendance problems had very different causes.
The 20-year-old said she struggled with bullying, undiagnosed autism and deteriorating mental health during her time at Les Beaucamps and later St Sampson’s High School.
She said classrooms often felt overwhelming and by Year 10 she had largely disengaged from school.
“I’d go in for the classes that I’d want, and then normally I’d get sent home for not being able to go in or just couldn’t be there,” Ms Bowring said.
She eventually left school with passes in English, IT and Computer Science, but feared her future opportunities had disappeared.
“I thought I’d screwed it all up,” she said.
After struggling to find work and dealing with ongoing health issues, Miss Bowring eventually found employment in hospitality before deciding to take a different path.
Last year, she and a friend launched NJ Cleaning. Less than a year later, the business had become a limited company and was looking to take on staff.
Miss Bowring said much of what she has learned about running a business came not from qualifications, but from teaching herself through books borrowed from the library.
“As long as you like it, you’ll learn about it,” she said.
After struggling with work and health issues, she and a friend launched a successful cleaning firm, NJ Cleaning, which has since become a limited company.
Looking back, she believes schools need to do more to listen to pupils who are struggling.
“I think it’s really important for adults to understand that teenagers know what they’re feeling and to actually listen to them and what they need,” Miss Bowring said.
She added: “Students realistically want to learn. Everybody wants to learn. We all want to do something with our lives.”
‘Even my family called me lazy’
Jennie, not her real name, said anxiety and bullying caused her attendance to spiral after she started at La Mare de Carteret.
“I was worried to go to school because of bullies and a lack of friends,” she said.
As her attendance worsened, she said education staff made repeated visits to her home, but she often found it impossible to engage.
“I either was not in the room or refused to show my face and speak.”
She eventually stopped attending school altogether during Year 10, but later completed her English and Maths qualifications in the school’s Learning Support Unit.
“The whole classroom vibe was much more chilled out and nobody judged me because we were all there for similar reasons,” she said.
She went on to enrol at the College of Further Education, but continued to struggle with her mental health, caused by issues including the death of a family pet.
Jennie experienced a major mental health crisis and left her courses before completing them.
Looking back, she believes too many people misunderstood what she was going through.
“I was called lazy and uncooperative, even by my own family,” she said.
Now raising her own children, she said she wants them to know “it’s okay to be different” and to speak up if they are struggling.
‘Students who think they have failed haven’t’
For Sammie Carre, attendance problems began when St Peter Port School closed and she was moved to St Sampson’s High School while most of her friends went to La Mare de Carteret.
Miss Carre said recent coverage of the merger of La Mare de Carteret and Guernsey Grammar School to create Les Varendes High School had brought back memories of her own experience.
She was sent to St Sampson’s High School while most of her friends moved to La Mare de Carteret, a change she believes played a major role in her disengagement from education.
Miss Carre said she had been a model student before the move.
“My attendance was 100%. No detentions. My work was impeccable,” she said.
After moving schools, she became increasingly disengaged and often signed in before leaving the site to spend the day elsewhere.
Her GCSE results suffered badly.
“I could literally spell the word fudge with my GCSEs,” she joked.
But she insists those results did not define her future.
After leaving school, Miss Carre spent several years working for the States before deciding she wanted to return to education.
The experience helped her mature and gave her confidence to try again as a student.
Returning to the College of Further Education as a mature student, she achieved a triple distinction* in Engineering before going on to university in London to study Criminal Law.
“Students genuinely who think they have either failed in school, or think they’re going to fail, they absolutely haven’t,” Miss Carre said.
“I am evidence of that.”
‘Attendance isn’t a simple issue’
While each of the former pupils had different experiences, all said poor attendance was rooted in wider challenges rather than simply not wanting to go to school.
That is something the States says it wants to address through its new campaign.
Nick Hynes, Director of Education, said the initiative is designed to encourage attendance while helping families access support when problems emerge.
“This is about working in partnership with parents rather than looking to blame parents for non-attendance,” Mr Hynes said.
“We know that when a parent has a child who is not attending it can be really difficult, it can be stressful, it can be really challenging.”
He added that missing school can affect children socially and emotionally as well as academically.
