07 August 2025
LONDON – Responding to today’s Autumn Term pupil absence data, Impetus Senior Policy Advisor Dr Carlie Goldsmith said:
“Today’s Autumn Term attendance figures confirm what schools already know: far too many young people are still persistently absent. Attending school is the foundation for future success – and low attendance has become the key driver behind some of the most pernicious challenges for young people and our economy.
The children missing school today are tomorrow’s struggling job seekers. Low attendance reduces GCSE pass rates by 40 percentage points and doubles the likelihood of young people ending up not in education, employment, or training (NEET). Left unaddressed, the absence rates we see today could mean 512,000 failed GCSEs in five years and 71,000 young people out of work in a decade – but these are preventable outcomes with better support now. The challenge is particularly acute for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, who are twice as likely to be persistently absent, with one-third missing over 10% of their lessons.
Our upcoming report with Public First in September will explore why so many young people are missing from classrooms. But we already know that schools lack the resources to meaningfully tackle this generational crisis. Rather than punitive fines, we need a system built on relationships – where every child has a trusted adult in their school and access to early support. Only holistic solutions can stem the tide of lost learning and meet the defining challenge of this generation.”
The above calculations are based on data from Impetus’ Youth Jobs Gap research and the Children’s Commissioner’s Missing Children, Missing Grades report. The Children’s Commissioner’s report found that being persistently absent in year 10 and 11 is associated with around a 40-percentage point reduced likelihood of passing GCSE English and maths (see Figure 12), consistent with DfE data from before the pandemic. Likewise, good GCSEs are associated with a NEET rate of 11%, as opposed to 25% for young people without these qualifications. As such, we were able to take the total number of persistently absent pupils and multiply it by 40% to determine the number of young people unlikely to pass their GCSEs who likely would have passed if they attended school more consistently. We then took 14% of this value to determine the number of persistently absent young people likely to be NEET in adulthood who otherwise would likely be in work.
Taken together, we can also conclude that the increase in persistent absence from 11% before the pandemic to 20% post-pandemic likely adds roughly 0.5% to the overall NEET rate.
Impetus transforms the education and employment outcomes of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. We do this by using our deep expertise and high calibre networks to give the best non-profits in these sectors the essential ingredients to have a real and lasting impact. Through a powerful combination of long-term funding, direct capacity building support from our experienced team and our pro bono partners, alongside research and policy influencing to drive lasting systems change, we work towards a society where all young people can thrive in school, pass their exams and unlock the doors to sustained employment, for a fulfilling life.
To find out more about Impetus, visit impetus.org.uk.
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