Did you ever bunk off school? And has it done you any harm? Today the latest truancy figures for schools in England show a fall in the number of half days missed by children during the spring term this year compared to 2007.
Good news for education ministers - and there isn't a lot of that around these days - and a chance to claim that their policies are working. A cynic might suggest that the fall in the number of days missed is simply a reflection of the fact that there are 150,000 fewer kids in schools in 2008 than there were last year but, no, the percentage of absences (authorised and unauthorised) has dropped a bit too.
More significant is the fact that the spring term this year was about a week and a half shorter than in 2007 so there were fewer possible bunking off days.
About 1.5m school days were lost because of family holidays - most of them authorised by schools (possibly with gritted teeth) - which really annoys teachers because they are missing out on those out of season deals but it hard to see as a major educational problem.
The real problem is the small percentage of children who miss more and more lessons - lurking around in school as well as not coming to school at all - and who can't find a way back because they haven't a clue what the teacher is going on about.
