Education Scotland’s Improving Attendance Quality Improvement Programme is a strategic initiative aimed at supporting schools and local authorities across Scotland to better understand, plan for and improve pupil attendance through quality improvement approaches.
In the 2024–25 session, the programme was launched in Dumfries and Galloway with a targeted group of secondary schools, helping them to use data, QI tools and collaborative improvement cycles to identify barriers and test change ideas that strengthened attendance and engagement. Early evaluation showed enhanced use of improvement methodologies, deeper analysis of attendance data, and stronger professional dialogue across participating schools. Building on this, the programme has been expanded in Dumfries and Galloway 2025–26 to offer bespoke support to all primary schools and their local authorities, with a view to embedding effective practice nationwide, aligning attendance improvement with wider school improvement cycles and reinforcing pupil voice in efforts to boost regular school attendance.
Understanding Quality Management Systems to Support Attendance - Diana Beveridge
