Parents who work from home may be behind rise in school absences

Parents who have been working from home since the pandemic are keeping their children off school with them, the chief inspector of Ofsted has suggested.

Sir Martyn Oliver, who has launched his first annual report on education and children's social care in England, said the trend could be seen in lower attendance figures on Fridays. Staying at home at the end of the week appears to be part of a wider trend of "unorthodox schooling" since the pandemic, which includes part-time timetables and hybrid learning.

Oliver's report said education had become "fractured and fragmented for too many children", while pupil attendance remained a "stubborn and damaging issue" after the Covid-19 lockdowns.

In an interview shortly before the report was published on Thursday, Oliver said parents working from home had contributed to the issue of school absences.

"Pre-pandemic, we used to notice as headteachers and teachers that if parents did work from home they would send their children in," he told Good Morning Britain.

"But now post-pandemic we also see parents are working from home and sometimes they keep their children off with them. We notice that because on Fridays attendance tends to go down more than any other day."