Schools in the area of
Teaching children in Swindon who cannot be in school
Arranged by schools in Swindon
Arranged by schools in Swindon
Separately, 100 children in Swindon were on no school's roll and not being educated anywhere else when schools last counted, out of 34,700 across England.
12% of new education, health and care plans were issued inside the statutory twenty weeks in 2025, against 46% across England. A child waiting on one is waiting without a timetable.
When a child cannot attend school, the obligation to keep educating them does not pause. It moves to the local authority. In practice the child is still on a school roll, still known to a head of year, and still waiting for someone to arrange something.
Where a child of compulsory school age would not otherwise receive suitable education, the local authority must arrange it.
Section 19, Education Act 1996
secondary pupil enrolments in Swindon were persistently absent, missing a tenth or more of their sessions, 2024/25.
That is 23.9% of enrolments in Swindon, against 23.4% across England.
Department for Education, Pupil absence in schools in England, released 26 March 2026.
In 3 Swindon schools last term, the thing that got arranged was Purple Ruler. Across the authority we are engaged with 4. This page sets out exactly what that amounted to over one term.
Between 5 January 2026 and 31 March 2026, this is what Purple Ruler taught in Swindon. Every figure counts only sessions that actually ran.
Purple Ruler teaches children across England who cannot get into a classroom. The teachers, the timetable and the class groups are the same wherever a child is placed. What follows is only the Swindon part of that, and it is drawn from this authority's own record rather than from anything we say about ourselves.
Swindon runs a little above the England rate for persistent absence. It is not a dramatic gap and it is a real one, and the section above has the figures. What it means here is that the pressure is steady rather than exceptional, which is the kind that gets absorbed year after year until somebody counts it. Every place counted here was arranged by schools in Swindon, each buying directly and separately from the others. The authority commissioned none of it, so the duty sits at the centre while the provision answering it is already running, school by school, out of sight.
What runs in Swindon is a full-time online school, curriculum-matched teaching, SEND tutoring and academic tutoring. Named as they appear on an invoice: Academy is a complete timetable for a child who cannot attend any physical setting; Blueprint is lessons built on the child's own school syllabus, so that nothing is lost while they are out of the room; Compass is one-to-one and small groups of up to six, built around SEND and ESOL need, at the pace the child can take; Distinction is aimed at a named subject and an approaching exam. The timetable here runs well past the core. Alongside English, maths and science we have taught combined science, mathematics and science , which is what makes it a school day rather than a holding pattern. The schools are Abbey Park School, Highworth Warneford School, The Ridgeway School & Sixth Form College and UTC Swindon. This is not a new arrangement. Most of what we have taught in Swindon happened before this term, which means the figures above are a slice of something longer rather than the whole of it.
This is also where being a national provider stops being a boast and starts being the mechanism. A class is not built around one school or one authority. Children are grouped across both, so a small number in Swindon who could never fill a class alone are taught in a full one, at their own year and their own level, by a teacher who has the subject. It is why a place can start in days rather than at the start of a term, and it is the answer to the question every authority asks first, which is how this can possibly work for the numbers they are actually holding.
The figure above worth pausing on is not how many lessons ran but who taught them. It is overwhelmingly the same teacher each week rather than whoever was free. For a child whose year has come apart, and who has usually had a great many adults pass through it, that consistency is not a detail. It is often the thing that makes the rest possible.
These are the schools in the authority that have brought Purple Ruler in for at least one child. Individual referral numbers are each school's own business, so they are not published here.
Children out of the classroom still sat a real timetable. Across the term we taught 7 subjects in Swindon, led by the core three.
Schools choose the provision that fits the child. These are the four in use across the authority, and how many schools use each.
A full-time online school place for a child who cannot attend any physical setting.
Curriculum-matched teaching that keeps a child on their own school's syllabus while they are out of the room.
One-to-one teaching and small groups of up to six, built around SEND and ESOL need, at the pace the child can take.
Targeted teaching aimed squarely at exams and attainment.
Sixty seconds on each provision this authority's schools actually use, so you can see the room rather than read about it.
Used for: Pupils without a school place, or unable to attend one.
A full timetable taught live, with daily registration, for pupils who are not attending a school site.
Used for: Pupils attending school whose attainment has stalled.
Targeted tutoring in a named subject, alongside a pupil's existing timetable.
Used for: EBSA, behaviour, medical needs, and pupils awaiting placement.
Your own online provision, running to your timetable and your schemes of work, taught live in groups of up to six. It is yours, not a place we sell seats in.
Used for: SEND and EHCP provision where a group is not appropriate.
One to one with a SEND specialist, at any time of day, on a schedule built around what the pupil can actually manage that week.
The figures in these four boxes describe the provision across all our work, not this authority. Every other number on this page is this authority’s own.
After a lesson we ask the child what they thought of it. This is every answer we have so far, and it is a small number: 23 answers from 9 maths groups in Purple Ruler Academy between 20 July and 19 August 2026. They are not this authority's children. We publish it because it is the only thing on this page said by a child rather than about one.
Purple Ruler, student feedback survey, 20 July to 19 August 2026. Counts rather than percentages, because a percentage off twenty-two answers reads like a survey of thousands. Two questions are left out on purpose: whether the child had a technical problem, and whether they had anything to report, which is a safeguarding route rather than a view of the teaching.
Claire's daughter stopped being able to attend school at 13. She sat her GCSEs this summer. Claire is in Buckinghamshire rather than here, so this is a borrowed voice like the school account further down, and her daughter is never named.
Claire Ball, parent of a Purple Ruler learner. Three minutes on what changed, in her own words. Captions are on the picture throughout.
Hannah Johnson, Principal for Inclusion at Ark Elvin Academy, in Brent. The provision described here is the same one running in your area, commissioned the same way.
Physical alternative provision was slow to arrange, capped by space and expensive, and for a child kept at home by anxiety a different building simply relocated a door they would not walk through.
What changed was the teaching following the school’s own curriculum and the exam boards its pupils were already entered for, so that coming back does not mean starting again.
Read the accountHannah Johnson, Ark Elvin Academy. Three minutes on what physical provision could not do, and what changed when the teaching moved. Captions are on the picture throughout.
It was more cost-effective for us to go through Purple Ruler.
Bal GillLondon Borough of Barking and Dagenham
Bal Gill, London Borough of Barking and Dagenham. The full interview, five minutes, on why the borough moved its home tuition to us. Captions are on the picture throughout.
Bal Gill commissions for London Borough of Barking and Dagenham, not for Swindon Borough Council. It is quoted here because it is the one commissioner voice we hold that is signed off for publication, and a commissioner's own words are worth more than ours even when they are somebody else's.
Provision that discharges a statutory duty has to stand up to scrutiny. These are the mechanisms behind every lesson counted on this page.
Every lesson is taught by an experienced teacher. This is school provision delivered online, not supplementary tutoring.
Across spring term 2026, 89.9% of lessons were taught by that class's own teacher, across the 22 Swindon classes that met more than once. A class that met once cannot show a change of teacher. A child was present for 88% of the 341 lessons we hold a register for, so this is a figure about who taught rather than who attended. Purple Ruler teaching and attendance records.
Lessons are recorded, staff are DBS checked, and safeguarding follows KCSIE. A designated lead is reachable throughout the school day, and when a child misses a lesson somebody rings home the same day.
Sessions are observed and graded against a rubric, so quality is measured continuously rather than reported after the fact.
Each placement produces an attendance and progress record the school and the authority can use as evidence that the duty is being met.
Every one of these schools found us on their own. That works, but it means Swindon is buying the same provision 4 times over, with no single view of which children are in it. An authority-level arrangement changes that.
Every page like this one proves what was delivered and then stops. This is the part a commissioner actually asks about.
Today every place in Swindon is arranged by a school, not by Swindon Borough Council. A school can start on its own, and the authority can commission directly instead if it would rather hold one arrangement than several.
Which children you are trying to place, which of the four provisions fits each of them, and what it would cost. Thirty minutes is enough, and the calendar below shows real times in your own timezone.
Each placement produces an attendance and progress record the school and the authority can both use as evidence, and a designated safeguarding lead reachable through the school day.
Nothing about attendance or exam results. Those belong to whoever arranged the place, and the figures here count lessons we delivered.
Every authority on this list has its own page built the same way, from its own records, with the same refusals about what may and may not be claimed. The nearest to you are Bath and North East Somerset, Hampshire and Hillingdon. Reading one of them is the quickest way to judge whether what you have read here is a pattern or a coincidence.
Bath and North East SomersetSee what we delivered
HampshireSee what we delivered
HillingdonSee what we deliveredEvery authority we work in is listed on the index.
We can walk through this term's delivery, the schools involved, and what an authority-wide arrangement would look like in practice.
Book a 30-minute conversation at purpleruler.com/book · hello@purpleruler.com
Take the short version of Swindon instead. It is this page with the figures, the schools and the subjects kept and the long reading taken out, built for forwarding to somebody who will not read all of this, and it needs nothing from you.
Your contact for Swindon
Daniel Demarmels
Looks after our work across the south of England, which includes Swindon.
daniel.demarmels@purpleruler.com · put time straight in their diary
The photograph. Illustrative, from our own library. It is not a photograph of a child we teach, and no child on this page is pictured.
Our figures. Lesson counts are taken from Purple Ruler's own delivery records for the term stated, counting only sessions that ran and were completed. Cancelled and flagged sessions are excluded. Placement and school counts cover all Purple Ruler work in the authority to date.
Department for Education, Children missing education, Autumn term 2025/26, published 2026-01-15.
Department for Education, Education, health and care plans, calendar year 2025, published 2026-09-17.
3,507 (2024/25): Department for Education, Pupil absence in schools in England, released 26 March 2026.
This page reports delivery only. It makes no claim about attendance rates or examination outcomes, which are held by the schools.
Marks and attribution. Swindon Borough Council's mark identifies the authority this report covers. Purple Ruler is not commissioned by Swindon Borough Council. School marks are the property of their schools.