Primary schools teach children many of the core skills they will need throughout the rest of their educational journey.
But when it comes to mastering them, absences can add up - whether they stem from illnesses, unauthorised term-time holidays, or any other reason.
A recent Department for Education report found that attendance has close ties to pupil attainment all the way through to when they sit their GCSEs. But it also showed that attendance makes a difference to young learners even in their earlier primary school days.
The report said that primary pupils who attended school nearly every day in Year 6 were 1.3 times more likely to meet the Government’s expected standards in reading, writing and maths compared to pupils who only attended 90-95% of the time. This means missing just 10 days of school shaves down their chances by around 25%.
Yet England’s overall school attendance rates still leave much to be desired. The Government’s latest absence and attendance figures, covering the full 2023/24 school year show that the overall absence rate - the percentage of half-days missed for all pupils - still lingers well above pre-pandemic figures. One in five pupils were also labelled ‘persistently absent’, meaning they missed at least 10% of these half-day sessions.
Using official data, we’ve taken a look at state-funded primary schools across the country to see which have the lowest rates of pupils missing class for any reason - to create a league table of England’s top primary schools for attendance. We’ve only included schools with an absence rate below 2.5% - an incredible achievement for any school community.
This has allowed many smaller village and community schools with fewer pupils overall to shine. But equally, a number of larger city schools with hundreds of pupils have also made the list.
Here were the 19 schools that met our criteria:
1. Lubavitch Boys' Primary School
The primary school with the very lowest absence rate in all of England is this Orthodox Jewish boys’ primary academy, in London’s Hackney borough. It has about 104 pupils. In the 2023/24 school year, it had an incredibly low overall absence rate of just 1.6%. | File photo/Adobe Stock
2. Greenhaugh Primary School
Next up is this very small local authority-maintained primary school in the village of Greenhaugh, Northumberland. It only has about 14 pupils, and like many smaller schools, its performance data is not published due to its size. In the 2023/24 school year, it had a very low overall absence rate of just 1.8%. | Google
3. St Peter's Church of England Primary School, Leeds
St Peter’s is a local authority-maintained Anglican primary school in Leeds, West Yorkshire. It is a larger school, with about 257 pupils, and a higher-than-average rate of pupils meeting the Government’s expected standards in reading, writing, and maths. In the 2023/24 school year, it too had an overall absence rate of just 1.8%. | Google
4. Lowick Church of England Voluntary Controlled First School
This is a small, local-authority maintained Anglican first school, which takes children from the age of 2 through to 9. It is based in Lowick, Northumberland, and has about 36 pupils. In the 2023/24 school year, it had an overall absence rate of 2%. | Google