Education outcomes for looked after children: 2016 to 2017

School exclusions

• ↓ Exclusion rates for looked after pupils continue to fall
• ★ Looked after children are much more likely to be excluded from school than the general population of pupils

In comparison with the general school population, this section presents data on the numbers and rates of exclusions of the 1,019 looked after children at publically-funded schools who were successfully linked to schools data, and who experienced an exclusion. Exclusions data is collected every two years.

Table 4.1 shows the rate of exclusion cases. As children can be excluded more than once per year a single child may be counted more than once in these figures. The rate of exclusions among looked after children is much higher than in the general school population (169 cases per 1,000 pupils looked after for the full year, compared with 27 per 1,000 in the general school population). The fall in the rates of exclusions for looked after children is much greater than the fall in rates of exclusions for all pupils, meaning that the gap between these groups is narrowing.

Table 4.1: Exclusion case rate per 1,000 pupils by all pupils, looked after children and sector, 2009/10 to 2016/17

As seen in chart 5, looked after children are showing a continuing decline in the rate of exclusions and the gap to the exclusion rate in the overall population is narrowing for both children looked after for the full year and children looked after for part of the year.

Chart 5: Exclusion case rate per 1,000 pupils (for all pupils, children looked after for full year and children looked after for part of the year), 2009/10 - 2016/17

Where Table 4.1 presents data on the rate of cases of exclusions, including potential multiple counts of the same child, Table 4.2 presents data on the total number of individual children excluded, resulting in lower figures. In all groups, the rate of children excluded is greater in secondary schools compared with primary schools.

Table 4.2: Number of pupils excluded and exclusion rate per 1,000 pupils by all pupils, looked after children and sector, 2016/17

Accommodation type

As with attendance, there is a similar disparity in rates of exclusion according to type of accommodation. Those children in residential accommodation tend to have higher rates of exclusions than those looked after in the community. Children looked after at home have a noticeably higher exclusion rate than others looked after in the community (Table 4.3).

Table 4.3: Cases of exclusions for looked after children, by accommodation type, 2016/17 ⁽¹⁾

(1) Cells containing * represent small numbers that have been suppressed to maintain confidentiality.
(2) Includes with prospective adopters.
(3) Includes in secure care accommodation and crisis care.

There is a tendency for looked after children with a greater number of placements to have a higher rate of exclusions ( Table 4.4) though the majority of children only had one placement. Children looked after for part of the year with more than one placement have a notably high rate of exclusions.

Table 4.4: Cases of exclusions for looked after children, by number of placements, 2016/17