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Nudge Education Policy Library

NEO — Attendance and Admission Register Policy

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Date14 October 2026
Review DateDecember 2026, then annually, or sooner if practice or legislation changes
OwnerDirector, Nudge Education Online & Head of School; oversight by the Nudge Education National Designated Safeguarding Lead
Approved byApproved by the Director, NEO & Head of School on 14 October 2026 under authority delegated by the Proprietor (CEO of Nudge Education Ltd) on 13 October 2026; for noting at the NEO board on 3 December 2026
Versionv10.26

A fully online alternative provision for learners aged 11–18

1. Purpose and scope

This policy sets out how Nudge Education Online (NEO) keeps its admission register and its attendance register, how attendance is recorded and followed up, and how local authorities are notified when a learner joins or leaves. It exists because the DfE’s online education standards require that “appropriate admission and attendance registers are maintained” (OEAS standard 4.7), and because a register that is accurate every day is the first safeguard against a child going missing from education.

NEO is a fully online alternative provision for learners aged 11–18, operated by Nudge Education Ltd (Company Number 10192753). NEO is pursuing accreditation under the DfE Online Education Accreditation Scheme (OEAS). NEO is not a DfE-registered independent school and is not subject to ISI inspection. The Education (Pupil Registration) (England) Regulations 2006 (as amended) and the DfE’s Working together to improve school attendance (statutory for schools from August 2024) do not bind NEO directly; NEO applies their register and notification requirements as its own standard because they are what the online education standards expect and what commissioners rely on. Statutory responsibility for a learner’s education remains with the commissioning local authority and, where applicable, the home school.

This policy applies to every learner on a full-time or part-time NEO timetable, every learner in a Discovery Phase, and every learner receiving one-to-one tuition. It applies to all NEO staff, Qualified Educators and Practitioner-Mentors. It is read with the Nudge Education Attendance Policy & Procedures and its NEO Online Addendum, which set the engagement expectations and the EBSNA-aware response to non-attendance; this policy adds the register itself and the statutory-style notifications.

2. The admission register

NEO keeps a single admission register for all learners, held in the NEO operational system with access restricted to the Head of School, the Engagement and Operations Co-ordinator, the Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) and the SENCo. For each learner it records:

  • full name, sex, date of birth and the name and address of every parent or carer with whom the learner lives, with an emergency contact;
  • the date of admission and the route in (commissioned placement, family-funded, Discovery Phase, part-time package, tuition);
  • the commissioning local authority and, where the learner is on roll elsewhere, the home school;
  • whether the learner has an Education, Health and Care Plan, is a looked-after child, or is on a child protection or child-in-need plan (recorded as a flag; detail is held by the DSL);
  • the learner’s NEO timetable (days, hours, route) and any agreed reasonable adjustment to attendance;
  • the date of leaving, the reason, and the destination where known.

A learner is entered on the register on the first day NEO has agreed they will attend (the Monday start confirmed at the admissions gate), not on the day of the referral. A learner is removed on the date their placement ends under the NEO — Withdrawal Policy, or on the day NEO is satisfied the learner has transferred to another setting. Tuition learners who remain on roll at another school are entered on a separate section of the register marked “on roll elsewhere”, so that NEO’s counts of full-time learners are never inflated.

3. The attendance register

NEO records attendance twice on every day a learner is timetabled: once at the start of the morning (the 09:30 mentor group or the learner’s first timetabled session) and once at the start of the afternoon (the 13:00 Practitioner-Mentor check-in or the learner’s first afternoon session). Each mark is one of:

  • Present — joined the live session within the grace period and remained for the session, or met the adjusted attendance pattern recorded in the learner’s support plan;
  • Late — joined after the grace period;
  • Authorised absence — absence agreed in advance with NEO or explained by the family and accepted by the Head of School (illness, medical appointment, religious observance, exceptional circumstances);
  • Unauthorised absence — no explanation, or an explanation NEO cannot accept;
  • Not required to attend — the learner is not timetabled for that session (part-time packages, tuition, Discovery Phase days), recorded so that the register is complete and the percentage is honest.

Attendance for a session is confirmed by the Qualified Educator or Practitioner-Mentor who ran it, from the live session’s participant record and their own observation. Cameras-off is not by itself a reason to mark a learner absent (see the Attendance Policy NEO addendum). The register is closed for the day by 16:00; corrections after that are made by the Engagement and Operations Co-ordinator with a note of who changed what and why.

4. Following up absence

A learner who is expected and does not join is contacted the same session by their Practitioner-Mentor through the agreed channel. The purpose of the call is to confirm the learner is safe and to understand the barrier, not to sanction. If no contact can be made by the end of the morning, the DSL is told the same day. Three consecutive missed sessions trigger a safeguarding review by the DSL with the Practitioner-Mentor, and, for a commissioned placement, a notification to the commissioner. Patterns that suggest a learner is at risk of becoming missing from education are handled under the NEO — Children Missing Education Policy.

Persistent absence (attendance below 90% of timetabled sessions over a half-term) is reviewed with the family and the commissioner, and the support plan is revised. NEO does not use penalty notices, exclusion or withdrawal of curriculum access as a response to absence.

5. Notifying the local authority

NEO notifies the local authority in which the learner lives:

  • when a learner is added to the admission register, within five working days of the entry, giving the learner’s name, date of birth, address, start date, route and the name of any previous setting;
  • when a learner is removed from the admission register, as soon as the ground for removal is known and no later than the day of removal, giving the date of leaving, the reason and the destination where known;
  • immediately, and without waiting for a scheduled report, where a learner has been absent without explanation for ten school days, or NEO cannot locate the learner or the family.

Notifications go to the local authority’s children-missing-education contact, and, where the placement is commissioned, to the commissioning officer. Where the learner has an EHCP the SEN casework team is copied. The Engagement and Operations Co-ordinator keeps a log of every notification with its date and the officer notified. NEO also provides attendance data to local authorities on request, in the format they ask for, and applies the same standard once the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 registers of children not in school commence in NEO’s area.

6. Reporting

Attendance is reported to commissioners on the cadence in the placement agreement (weekly during a stabilisation period, then fortnightly), as sessions scheduled, attended, late, authorised, unauthorised and not required, with an engagement narrative. Attendance and engagement for the whole provision are reported to the NEO board at every meeting as cohort counts and percentages, never by named learner. Learners and families see the learner’s own attendance in their weekly report.

7. Record keeping

The admission register is kept for the life of the provision; attendance registers are kept for three years from the end of the academic year to which they relate. Registers are held in the NEO Google Workspace tenant under the controls in the NEO — Data Protection, Confidentiality and Privacy Policy, with a weekly export held as a dated, read-only copy.

8. Roles and responsibilities

RoleResponsibility
The Proprietor (CEO of Nudge Education Ltd)Approves this policy; receives the attendance summary in the board pack.
Director, NEO & Head of SchoolOwns this policy; authorises absences; signs off the register before each board and commissioner report.
Engagement and Operations Co-ordinatorMaintains both registers; makes and logs local authority notifications; closes the daily register.
Designated Safeguarding LeadReceives same-day escalation of unexplained absence; leads the missing-from-education response.
Qualified EducatorsConfirm attendance for the sessions they teach.
Practitioner-MentorsTake the mentor-group and check-in marks; make the same-session welfare call.
Parents and carersReport absence before the first session of the day; keep contact details current.
CommissionersReceive attendance reports; lead statutory action where a child is missing education.

Paragraph references to DfE guidance should be checked against the current gov.uk text before this policy is minuted.

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