Attendance and Inclusion Lead with Ddsl

**Job Reference #**

EDV/2025/O/59185

**Location**

Hyde End Lane, Ryeish Green, Reading, Berkshire, RG7 1ER

**Contract Type**

Permanent

**Contract Term**

Full-Time

**Salary**

£34,305.21 - £36,600.18 Annually (Actual)
NJC 28 - 31

**Closing Date**

9:00am, 23rd Jun 2025

**Start Date**

1 July 2025

**Positions Available** 1

**About this Role**:
Oakbank is a school of potential that drives for the betterment for all. The school is committed to a journey of transformation, where staff, students and parents are committed to improving the quality and experience of education for its community. We believe that every child deserves to not only access the full curriculum, but should thrive in their curriculums, developing academically, personally and holistically as a result of passionate and adaptive teaching, resulting in committed learning that secures successful outcomes. Our current phase of school improvement features our entire team, working together at pace to offer greater stability, more innovation and creativity. The aim is for greater consistency for all students, enabling them to manage their learning and themselves more effectively.

Our collective determination to make Oakbank a happier and higher performing school affirms our commitment to our values: integrity, collaboration and excellence. We believe in excellence for our students to give them the opportunities to have choices in their lives, empowering them to choose the future that they desire off the back of hard work.

**Job Purpose**

To lead and coordinate both the inclusion and attendance strategies across the school, ensuring pupils receive timely and effective support for SEND, wellbeing, and attendance. The postholder will act as Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead (DDSL), working closely with pastoral teams, external agencies, and families to remove barriers to learning and promote safeguarding, inclusion, and regular attendance. To also work closely with the Local Authority to fulfil its obligations under all relevant Legislation.

**Main Duties and Responsibilities**

**Attendance**
- Assist with attendance across the school and work closely with the pastoral team (Deputy Heads of Year), and external agencies as required to improve attendance for all students.
- Conduct home visits to students in line with school policy, identifying reasons for non-attendance, working closely with families and others to break down barriers to learning and achieve regular attendance.
- Manage the process of addressing poor attendance across the school. Organising meetings as appropriate for vulnerable students ensuring all external agencies and relevant staff are invited.
- Conduct weekly safe and wellness checks (home visits) for absent student.
- Monitor the attendance of most vulnerable students at the school, including Child Looked After students, those that meet the threshold for child protection, children identified as being in need either by School staff or external agencies.
- To liaise with pastoral staff to raise concerns/problems, ensure accuracy of data and assist with improving pupil attendance
- To develop strong relationships with young people and their families using diplomacy and enthusiasm, to support and challenge, as appropriate, so as to reduce student non-attendance and exclusion from school.
- Develop attendance action plans for individual students with specific attendance concerns.
- Prepare professional reports and attend and contribute to meetings with Pastoral team and meetings concerning individual students as appropriate.
- Liaise with Senior Leadership Team to address any attendance concerns as required.
- Undertake Attendance interviews in school with individual students and external agencies.
- Ensure effective communication/consultation as appropriate with the parents of students through phone, letter and home visits as relevant, supporting with student contract outcomes.
- Liaise with the Assistant Headteacher, DHOYs and DDSLs and provide evidence of date, interventions and any other relevant information to support any Local Authority cases and meetings where poor attendance has reached the level of legal intervention.
- Provide support for families experiencing hardship by way of increasing awareness to external support agencies
- To support with the development of the provision of high-quality school attendance and welfare provision in line with all relevant legislation.
- To manage the data from the Student Absence line, messages from Parents/Carers and record on the school system ensuring accurate, recorded information and plan and implement absence calls to parents/carers and home visits as necessary where students have exceeded 5 days’ absence.
- To review, analyse and manage daily registers, communicating with Teachers where registers need updating or where support is required to complete registers in a timely manner. Feedback to SLT on maintenance of registers as necessary.
- To compile and manage Leav