Thousands of students missing from secondary schools before taking GCSEs, report warns

Thousands of children in England are missing from official education statistics after being removed from schools before they sit their GCSE exams, a new report warns.

Up to 7,700 students are estimated to have not taken any GCSE exams, or counted in any school league tables, despite remaining in England, according to research by FFT Education Datalab.

It can be partly blamed on students being off-rolled, which is where schools convince parents to remove pupils in an informal exclusion often to try and improve exam results, researchers said.

Schools are given a “perverse incentive to lose pupils who would bring results down” as league tables only measure students who remain on the school roll in January of Year 11, the study said.

A total of 22,000 pupils – a “concerning” rise from 20,000 in 2016 – left the state sector at some point between Year 7 and Year 11, and they did not return to a state school or alternative provision.

Thousands will have moved away from England, moved to private schools or have been home-schooled.

But between 6,200 and 7,700 students are unaccounted for, the study found.

Pupils in this group are more likely to have been eligible for free schools meals, have special educational needs, and have had lower attainment at primary school, according to researchers.

“We remain concerned that in some cases, pupils seen leaving school rolls will have been off-rolled – encouraged off the roll of a mainstream school in an informal exclusion in which the school’s best interests have trumped the pupil’s,” according to a blog post outlining the analysis.

Researchers say league tables should be weighted to take into account the amount of time a child had spent at each school.

For example, a pupil who had spent Year 7 to Year 11 at a school would count more than a pupil who had only joined in Year 9.

Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL), said: “These are extremely worrying findings and we need to know more about the reasons why these young people have apparently not completed their schooling or taken exams.

“There are likely to be factors at work which extend beyond the school gates. However, we are aware of anecdotal reports that a small number of schools may be off-rolling pupils – a practice which is utterly condemned by the vast majority of school leaders.

“We think off-rolling is rare but any incidents at all are a cause of great concern and must stop. These are exactly the young people who most need support to improve their life chances.”

Ofsted’s chief inspector, Amanda Spielman, told MPs earlier this year she was “concerned” about a rise in home education, which she said could be partly blamed on schools “shovelling” children back to parents.

Research in April found more than one in five teachers and senior leaders wrongly believe they can encourage parents to remove their children from school.

The study, by the National Foundation for Educational Research, found some teachers (6 per cent) wrongly think they can send pupils home to “cool off” without recording it as an exclusion.

Some believe they can encourage parents to home educate and they can record pupils as “educated off-site” when the school had encouraged them not to come to classes.

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “Exclusions guidance specifically states that informal or unofficial exclusions – such as encouraging parents to take their children out of school – are unlawful under all circumstances.

“Any decision to exclude a pupil should be lawful, reasonable and fair, and must be formally recorded by the school. Our guidance outlines how exclusions should be used, and includes summaries for schools and parents on the rules of exclusions.”