Attendance at local authority settings during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic: 13 to 17 July 2020 (updated)

On Wednesday 10 June 2020 it was announced that schools would be open for more pupils from 29 June. The Welsh Government has worked with DataCymru to develop a weekly data collection from local authorities. This captures the number of:

• schools that were open
• children that were invited to attend school
• children who did attend school for at least one session during the week

As at 23 July 2020, full data has been provided by 20 local authorities. These authorities are Isle of Anglesey, Gwynedd, Conwy, Denbighshire, Wrexham, Powys, Ceredigion, Pembrokeshire, Carmarthenshire, Neath Port Talbot, Bridgend, Vale of Glamorgan, Rhondda Cynon Taf, Merthyr Tydfil, Blaenau Gwent, Caerphilly, Torfaen, Monmouthshire, Newport and Cardiff.

Children in Isle of Anglesey have now returned to schools following the coronavirus outbreak in Llangefni.

The key figures for Wales during the week of 13 to 17 July 2020 in the 20 local authorities that provided a full return are:

• 1,319 out of 1,323 schools were open (99.7%)
• around 274,000 pupils were invited to attend at least one session last week
• 161,000 pupils did attend at least one session last week
• of those pupils that were invited, 59% of pupils attended, slightly down on the 61% that attended in the previous week
• 43% of the total number of pupils attended at least one session (based on the number of pupils in each LA minus those in years 11 and 13 who are much less likely to attend). This is slightly down on the 46% that attended at least one session in the previous week.

The data should be regarded as provisional. Figures have been taken from management information and are subject to change if further more up to date information is received. They have not yet been subject to the same validation processes undertaken for official statistics releases.

We are expecting other local authorities to provide data this week and we will update this information as soon as we can.

Most schools in Wales closed for the summer holidays on 17 July. There will be no further update to this data after this week.

Schools in Wales have been closed to most pupils since 20 March.

Up to 26 June we collected and published daily information on attendance at local authority settings. This is not comparable to the data presented in this headline.

For further information on the process of reopening schools, please see our guidance on increasing operations in schools from 29 June.

For more general information on coronavirus please see our guidance on Education and child care: coronavirus

Statistician: Stephen Hughes
Telephone: 0300 025 5060
Email: school.stats@gov.wales

Media: 0300 025 8099

SFR 91/2020