DENTISTS in Blaenau Gwent are being asked not to book appointments for children and young people during school hours, an education chief has said.

This is part of a drive to boost attendance figures at schools in the county borough which are amongst the worst in the whole of Wales.

At a meeting of Blaenau Gwent County Borough Council’s Labour Cabinet on Wednesday, January 15 senior councillors received a report on “attendance and exclusions and elective home education.”

This report explained the work being done by the local authority to increase school attendance, bring down exclusions, and how they are dealing with the rising numbers of children and young people who are now choosing to be educated from home.

Director of education, Luisa Munro-Morris told councillors that since September last year a “pathway” for all schools in Blaenau Gwent to follow is now in place and has already seen some improvements in attendance figures.

Deputy council leader Cllr Helen Cunningham said: “I can see that all schools are now implementing the pathway.”

She asked if some schools were experiencing challenges in being able to implement the pathway in the way they want to?

Dr Munro-Morris said: “It is harder for our smaller schools to release senior or middle (school) leaders to be able to support with the pathway, as it does really need a dedicated member of staff.

“It works best where a member of staff comes out of the classroom either full or part time and for this is their key area of work.

“It’s easier for or larger schools from a financial perspective and in terms of staffing.”

She went on to explain some of the tactics being used to improve attendance.

Dr Munro-Morris said: “One of things we have done is contact all the dental practices in the area and talked to them around how important it that they try and make appointments after school, or first thing in the morning.

“Because we know that when parents make an appointment at 1pm they just keep the child off for the whole day and there’s no reason for that.”

Cllr Cunningham asked whether smaller schools could “pair up” and share a member of staff to manage the attendance pathway.

Dr Munro-Morris said that this was a “really good idea.”

“It’s not something we have pushed as a local authority, and we could do more on” said Dr Munro-Morris.

Councillors went on to approve the report.

Primary schools attendance figures for 2024/2025 to date is 92.4 per cent which is above the target of 92 per cent.

This is an increase form 90.3 per cent in 2022/2023 which was the second worst attendance figures in the whole of Wales with the national average being 91.5 per cent.

Data for primary school attendance figures for last year had not been verified.

Attendance figures in secondary schools for 2024/2025 to date is 89.8 per cent which is above the council’s target of 88.7 per cent.