Improving student attendance

School absences are correlated with lower attainment and higher risks of crime and adverse outcomes in later life.

We used timely prompts to try to reduce absenteeism in students. This term refers to the tried-and-tested idea in behavioural science that if you give people reminders at the right time, it can help them to take action.

We texted parents to let them know how many days of school their child had missed and remind them of the importance of school attendance.

An exploratory analysis found an increase of 4 percentage points in the proportion of students with good attendance records (95 per cent attendance or above).