Attendance and Absence in Scottish Schools: 1996/97 to 1998/99

3. Information on pupil exclusions

Pupils who are excluded from school are grouped into two categories of exclusion/removed from the register and temporary exclusions. SOEID Circular 2/98 requested returns from each education authority on the total number of pupils excluded/removed from the register from any school in its area from the start of the school session 1998/99 and also on the circumstances and length of exclusions.

Some education authorities in the table below have 0 for exclusion/removed from the register because, as a matter of policy, they do not permit such exclusions. Comparisons between and among education authorities should be treated with caution.

The figures recorded for pupils permanently excluded across Scotland during 1998/99 were 25 pupils from primary and 104 from secondary schools. The numbers by education authority are shown in Table 1.

Table 1: Number of pupils excluded/removed from the register in primary and secondary schools in each council, 1998/99

The number of half days during which primary school pupils were temporarily excluded is given below. West Lothian was unable to provide data for temporary exclusions in primary schools.

To provide comparative data for different sizes of authority, it is necessary to use an average measure for temporary exclusions. The average measure which is used for absence, "average number of half days per pupil", is also used as the basis for temporary exclusions which are compared by the "average number of half days per 100 pupils".

Table 2: Temporary exclusions from primary schools, 1998/99

Temporary exclusions in primary schools, across all stages, averaged 9 half days for each 100 pupils. It is not possible, from the data provided, to determine the actual number of pupils excluded. Some pupils were excluded more than once and exclusions were of varying lengths. Data now being collected will provide this information.

There are 38 school weeks in an academic year. Temporary exclusions were equivalent to 100 primary pupils being absent for all of the 1998/99 school session.