Attendance and punctuality are important. Students are expected to attend school every day and arrive on time for all classes.

If your child is going to be late, please notify the school before 9 am. This helps us avoid unnecessary concern and follow-up calls to check on your child’s whereabouts.

When arriving late:

• Senior Campus studentsmust sign in at the
• Junior Campus studentsmust sign in at Main Reception.

Signing in is essential for health and safety, so we know who is on site at all times. Please note that students who arrive very late may be marked as absent for that class.

If your child feels unwell or is injured during the school day, please remind them to go to the Health Centre as their first step. This ensures they are properly assessed and supported while at school.

Our School Nurse will evaluate your child’s condition and decide on the best course of action — whether that’s returning to class, resting in the sick bay, or contacting a parent or caregiver to discuss or arrange collection.

For safety and accurate attendance records:

• Students must not pre-arrange to be collected via email or phone.
• All sickness-related pickups are managed by the Health Centre team or administrative staff.

We appreciate your support in encouraging your child to follow the correct procedures when feeling unwell at school.

If you need to collect your child during the school day, please notify the Attendance Officer in advance. You can do this by:

• Emailing the Attendance Officer
• Logging the absence in the KAMAR Portal
• Using the school app

When leaving school:

• Senior Campus students must sign out at the Library
• Primary Campus students must sign out at Main Reception

This is essential for health and safety, so we know who is on site at all times.

Please note:

Signing in/out does not update attendance records — a parent or caregiver must still notify the Attendance Officer.

If your child returns to school later in the day, they must sign back in at the same location.

Signing in or out using the Vistab kiosks at school is important for health and safety, but it does not update attendance records.

To ensure your child’s attendance is correctly recorded, a parent or caregiver must notify the Attendance Officer (absences@kingstatic.allteams.dev) with confirmation of:

• Why the student is late or leaving
• That permission was given

Ideally, this should be done before the student arrives late or leaves school.

Even though your child signed in/out on the Vistab, if we haven’t received notification from you, an unexplained absence email will still be sent.

While it’s thoughtful to inform your child’s teacher, teachers cannot update attendance records.

To ensure your child’s absence is correctly recorded, please also notify the Attendance Officer. You can do this by:

• CC’ing absences@kingstatic.allteams.dev when emailing the teacher
• Logging the absence in the KAMAR Portal
• Using the school app

This helps us keep accurate records and prevents unexplained absence notifications.

If your child is absent due to illness for five or more days, a medical certificate is required.

If no certificate is provided, the absence may be recorded as Explained, Unjustified.

The school may also request a medical certificate in cases of frequent or recurring illness, even if the absences are shorter than five days.

If your child misses a lot of school because of mental health or physical health challenges, he/she may be eligible to get help from the Northern Regional Health School.

We strongly encourage families to schedule non-medical appointments outside of school hours, as these absences — while explained — are not considered justified by the Ministry of Education.

Absences for medical appointments are considered justified, but where possible, we still prefer these to be scheduled outside of school time to minimise disruption to learning.

If your child needs to leave school during the day:

• Please notify the school in advance via email, the KAMAR Portal, or the school app
• Students must sign out at the Library (Senior Campus) or Main Reception (Junior Campus)
• If returning later, they must sign back in at the same location

This helps us maintain accurate attendance records and ensures student safety.

The Ministry of Education does not support holidays during term time, and considers such absences to be parent-condoned truancy. We strongly encourage families to plan holidays during the regular school breaks.

If your child will miss school for a planned non-medical reason:

No accommodation can be guaranteed for missed lessons or NCEA assessments without prior notice.

Please submit your leave request as early as possible, unless it’s due to urgent circumstances (e.g. bereavement).

How to notify us:

Absences of 1–3 days: (Year 1-10)

Email absences@kingstatic.allteams.dev

Absences of 4 or more days:

Email the appropriate contact based on your child’s year level:

• Primary School (Years 1–6):
  Cristal McKoy – karen.barr@kingstatic.allteams.dev
• Middle Years (Years 7–10):
  Vanessa Gatman – angela.andrew@kingstatic.allteams.dev
• Senior School (Years 11–13):
  All absence requests (1 day or more) must be emailed to
  Colin Thomson – nicole.gardner@kingstatic.allteams.dev

If your child was attending an in-school appointment and has been marked absent, they should contact the staff member they met with (e.g. Dean, Careers Advisor, Counsellor) to confirm their attendance.

We recommend that the student: Speaks to or emails the staff member directly

Only the staff member who held the meeting can verify the student’s presence, so it’s important that this follow-up is done promptly.

If students are marked absent for a period throughout the day and we have not heard from you, you will be contacted by email or phone call to advise you of the absence in a timely manner. Please reply to this with the details of the absence.

For Senior Campus students only:

At the Senior Campus, students are expected to take responsibility for following up on attendance discrepancies.

If your child was present in class but marked absent:

• They must speak to or email their classroom teacheras soon as possible.
• The classroom teacher is the only personwho can confirm attendance and request the Attendance Officer to make corrections.

If the class was taken by a reliever, the student should email their regular teacher, who can follow up to verify and ask the Attendance Officer to amend the attendance if appropriate.

If the teacher is away for an extended period, the student may contact their Dean for assistance.

Prompt follow-up is important to avoid detentions for unexplained absences.

There are two categories of absences: Justified and Unjustified.

As a parent or caregiver, what you see in the KWS Portal is a simplified version of the attendance codes used by staff. The label “Unjustified Absence” may refer to several Ministry of Education codes grouped under this category.

An unjustified absence means:

The absence was either unexplained, or

It was explained, but the reason does not meet the criteria set by the Ministry of Education or the school’s attendance policy for a justified absence.

This can sometimes cause confusion or concern. Please know that:

Your explanation is acknowledged and accepted as the reason for the absence.

The school is not passing judgment — we are simply following Ministry and school policy guidelines.

Put simply, while you may consider the absence justified and have provided a valid explanation, it may not meet the criteria for a “Justified” code under official policy.

Put simply, the reason does not fit within the school’s policy as a justifiable reason to take the student off school even though the parent may consider the absence was justified and may have provided a written explanation. Please note, that very few absence reasons are considered “Justified” as per the School Policy and the Ministry of Education.

If you’re interested, you can look further into this via this link – School Attendance Codes

The data included in the report includes all the occurrences when your child has been absent from school for any non-schooling matter. This includes both approved and non-approved absences.

The purpose of the report is to help families keep informed of their child’s attendance at school.

All parents/caregivers receive an attendance report. The school will contact parents/caregivers specifically should concerns exist about student attendance at school. Receiving the report does not mean there is an issue with attendance or that the school is unaware of a specific students attendance situation.

The school encourages parents/caregivers to use the report as a discussion starter with their children at their discretion. For some children, seeing improvements in their attendance over time maybe a timely encouragement. For others, seeing their current attendance level may aggravate issues unnecessarily.

Regular attendance at school is crucial for both academic attainment and student wellbeing. A recently published study (Webber, 2020) found an incremental reduction in attendance at school results in measurably lower educational outcomes being achieved. Another study noted that irregular attendance at school results in worse average outcomes relating to schoolwork-related anxiety, a sense of belonging, bullying, racism and motivation (McGregor & Webber, 2020). As stated in policy, KingsWay School provides a broad range of curriculum options and opportunities and encourages students to participate fully in school life. We create a safe, secure, inclusive environment for all learners and create a sense of belonging within the school community.

The report is issued every six weeks. The reporting cycle begins week 6 of Term 1, and then week 1 and week 6 of every subsequent term in the school year. As a result, parents/caregivers will receive seven reports annually. Given we have started issuing this report in Term 2 of 2025, you will receive a further four reports this year.

Each time a report is issued, attendance data is calculated year to date. That means parents can easily track improvements or otherwise over the course of a year.

Any occurrence when your child has been absent from school for any non-schooling matter. This includes things like medical leave, bereavement leave, national sport representation, as well as absences like a holiday during term time or caring for a sibling.