School requesting letter

gunsandbanjos

My child gets hospital appointments all the time and the letters sent out are pretty much just name, speciality, time, location etc.
Nothing worth getting excited about.

warehouse

Give them a copy.

Problem solved.

meer53

Why don't you want them to have a copy ?

susancs

It might be a good idea to request a copy of the school's attendance and absence policy. A number of schools in our area in their policies state that the Government considers an attendance of below 85% as cause for concern and the school has a duty to monitor these absences and may have to refer a child who has a pattern or either authorised or unauthorised absences to the local education welfare officers who may issue penality notices. I would think that your school are asking for evidence to support authorised absences so that they can back up their authorisation of your child's absences. As others have said the copy of the appointment letter will be kept confidential.

rpc

There is, presumably, no obligation on you to give them a copy just like there is no obligation on them to authorise an absence without evidence.

If you are happy with the consequences of unauthorised absence then there isn't an issue. If you want the absence authorised, then you will need to prove it.

jenhug

I always give a copy of appointment letters for the school files, plus copies of the write up of any appointments we have had. This way, they have access to the most relevant information regarding my childs SEN's and they can't say later that they didn't implement something helpful due to not knowing, I cannot imagine what could be on an appointment letter that the school wouldn't know about your child anyway.

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

There's a hell of a lot more information about your kid available in school relating to their SEN. It's usually known as the Inclusion Register.

Appointment letters will have their name, address, hospital reference number and maybe some special instructions relating to a particular test that's planned. None of that is particularly 'personal' or 'private'.

Unless, I suppose, you gave a fake address in order to get them into the catchment area in the first place?

GobbledyGook

What is on the letter that you don't want them to see?

I can't think of anything on a standard appointment letter that could be confidential in terms of something they don't already know.

If DD has an appointment and the letter doesn't have the test details on it then I add it. It helps the school know how to deal with it much better if they know what the child's visit actually entails in case they are expecting a child whose had a 10 minute chat to a doctor rather than one who has numerous procedures, had to not eat etc. All of it has an impact for the next few days/week so it's usually beneficial for them to know.

liney

If your child is statemented then the school already have in depth knowledge of their medical conditions. Why make enemies of the people who you will have regular meetings with, and will be taking care of and educating your child, for the next 6 years over something so trivial.

I can only assume there is a discrepancy with the address and catchment area, or that you intend to take a few days out for jollies and claim to be at non-existant appointments.

Drawing attention to yourself in this way will do you no favours.

claire16c

croyland87 wrote: »

That is not the case in my are I have never heard about plus I contacted the county council and they said they should not really ask for it.

Do you have some kind of problem with authority?