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At the end of March the DfES published a Statistical First Release on Pupil Absence in Secondary Schools in England, 2005/06. For the first time it is based on pupil level absence data collected via the new School Census which started in 2006 and collects data on a term by term basis.The figures showed that on any given day approximately 43,000 secondary school pupils are absent from school for various reasons and around 7 million half days were missed during the year. 7% of pupils were persistent absentees, missing school at least 1 day a week, and 2.4% accounted for more than half of all unauthorised absences.However, whilst overall truancy rate was higher than previous data showed, at the 436 schools which have been targeted for intervention persistent unauthorised absence has been reduced by 20% over the previous year showing that efforts to tackle the problem are working.For more information download the release at www.dfes.gov.uk/rsgateway/DB/SFR/s000718/SFR11-2007.pdf
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