When students miss 10% or more of school days per year, regardless of cause (excused or not), it is considered chronic absenteeism and a significant contributor to low academic performance. A pupil is considered chronically absent if they skip up to two days of school every month during the academic year. That accounts for around 18–20 days of missing class per academic year.
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Can You Explain Chronic Absenteeism?
For whatever reason, a student is deemed chronically absent if they miss 10% or more of their school days—equivalent to barely two days per month on average. Every absence, whether valid or not (including suspensions), is associated with a missed chance for education. Students absent from school regularly are at increased risk of falling behind in their coursework and ultimately not graduating from high school. We can all do our part to find a solution to the problem of chronic absenteeism and encourage regular attendance.
Related: Implementing the ‘Science of Reading’: The Behind the Scenes Work
Health Inequalities and The Achievement Gap are Associated With Chronic Absenteeism
Being Present is Essential
Showing up to class each and every day is essential. Chronic absenteeism predicts poor academic performance and a student’s dropout likelihood. Suppose a student is frequently absent from school. In that case, they will need help to study and progress at the required rate and eventually fall behind. Students who skip a lot of school also don’t have a chance to make friends, get involved, and explore potential career paths.
Students Should be in Class
The lack of regular school attendance is a significant problem for many children. Student populations disproportionately affected by chronic absenteeism include those from low-income backgrounds, pupils of colour, students with impairments, and youth associated with the juvenile justice system. Chronic absenteeism is also strongly related to crucial socioeconomic health variables. Some examples of issues that impact a student’s attendance include an unsafe school environment, bullying, unstable housing, substance misuse, and delinquency.
A Better Picture of Poverty examines chronic absenteeism and the crucial social support required by students, particularly those in New York City. The data demonstrates that chronically absent students are more likely to live in poverty, attend schools that do not meet their needs, and have limited access to social services. To further address the issue of chronic absenteeism, this paper delves into how a community school strategy may link children to various resources.
To Eradicate Chronic Absenteeism, School Workers Play a Crucial Role
Knowing the nature of chronic absenteeism and the people it impacts is the first step in finding a solution. Understanding the causes and repercussions of chronic child absence is necessary to find solutions that minimise or eliminate this problem. While it may take years to eliminate chronic absenteeism, school officials can take immediate action to support students’ success.
In the toolbox, the following federal agencies came together to recognise the gravity of chronic absenteeism and offer solutions: Justice, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, and Education.
Create and Utilise Data About Employee Absences
Ensure that early warning, preventive, and intervention systems are developed as a top priority. Chronic absence rates can only tell you so much. Schools and districts rely on robust data systems that provide timely information to respond to and prevent issues before they escalate.
Locate the kids who have been persistently absent from school or are at risk of becoming so. The next critical stage is investigating the reasons behind absenteeism and Why?
Make sure that all students have easier access to support services to reduce absenteeism so that students stay caught up to an unmanageable degree.
Seek out and join forces with like-minded organizations to tackle chronic absenteeism head-on by improving and expanding integrated services and interventions. The community school model is a great place to determine what to prioritize and who might help.
Conceive and Implement Constructive Strategies
Constructive and encouraging engagement must be incorporated to enhance students’ school attendance, involvement, and achievement. PBIS, counseling, and mentoring programs may be helpful.
Do not resort to disciplinary actions unless required. These can result in school suspensions, expulsions, and improper referrals of families and schools to law enforcement, and they are frequently ineffectual.
Centre Communities on Finding Solutions for Long-Term Absence
The significance of chronic absenteeism should be brought to the attention of families and young people.
Create workshops for teachers and other community members who work with schools to examine patterns of student absence and determine why.
Help students succeed by implementing programs and resources based on solid research.
Ensure That All Sectors Take Responsibility
Get the word out: chronic absenteeism is an issue that impacts everyone in the community.
Asinitiatives’ector initiatives’ effectiveness to determine the success level in eradicating chronic absenteeism.
Collaborate as a group to make tackling chronic absence a shared responsibility.
Every Student Every Day includes these four measures and community action guides, which are meant to encourage collective efforts to lower chronic absence.
Rewards as a Strategy to Eradicate Chronic Absence
One proven strategy for lowering absence rates is to provide incentives for pupils to show up to class. For example, Attendance is run by Diplomas Now. Students in the middle school are eligible to attend a dance as a prize for being present for at least 95% of the second quarter of school. Boston, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and Miami are among the cities nationwide that have implemented the incentive program, which includes other initiatives such as phoning absent students, tutoring, and case management to offer counseling, housing, and healthcare.
Count Me In! is another incentive-based program that has been introduced to several schools in California. The entire district is rewarded after each trimester for elementary schools and each semester for middle and high schools. There’s a year-end drawing where students can win even bigger prizes. One lucky high school student will win a new program of this program’s incentparents’influkids’parents’ and kids’ perspectives on attendance. Attendance has increased across the board thanks to this program.
Establishing solid relationships with students and their families, keeping careful tabs on attendance, finding out if students aren’t there, rewarding excellent attendance, and designating staff members to contact absent students are all components of effective anti-absentee programs.
Most Parents Do Not Know What to Mean When They Say Chronic Absenteeism is an Issue
Even though most American parents consider choro” ic absenteeism” a “major problem,” only one-third can identify it accurately.
Those results of a June 6 NPR/Ipsos poll show how difficult it is for schools to reverse the current downward trend in student attendance.
According to Robert Balfanz, director of the Everyone Graduates Center at Johns Hopkins University, parents tend to understate the children’s their children’s class absences. Additionally, chronic absenteeism may be unfamiliar to them, as it has recently become a research “and policy focus.
“There is often no readily available or consistently supplied data to students regarding their total absences thus far,” he stated. In April, it can be quite challenging to recall the exact number of school days your child missed in October and November.”
Chronic absenteeism rates, typically characterized as students missing 10% of school days for unexcused or excused causes have skyrocketed since the pandemic.
According to a state data tracker maintained by the American Enterprise Institute, the percentage of children classified as chronically absent increased from 15% in the 2018–19 school year to 28% in the 2022–23 school year. Absenteeism rates have not recovered to levels recorded before the epidemic, even if they have decreased in several states this academic year.
C.A.S. is a Term That Most Parents are Unable to Explain
From April 26 through May 3, pollsters asked 1,100 people about elementary, middle, and high school student attendance and 1,100 people from the general public.
While 58% of parents with school-aged children saw chronic absenteeism as a severe issue, 61% of the general public shared this view. When asked about pandemic learning loss, 60% of the general public and 55% of parents deemed it a serious issue.
Most parents defined Chronic absenteeism incorrectly, even though they acknowledged it was a concern. The accurate definition, as determined by 32% of parents, needs to include 10% or more of the school days. 51% of parents had a higher standard, considering a student chronically absent if they miss 20% of the school year.
Five Days of School Absence is The Most Common Number Reported by Parents
After a 180-day academic year, a student is considered chronically absent if they have missed 18 or more days of instruction. Researchers in attendance claim that teachers and parents can spot worrying patterns in student absences earlier when they measure by % instead of total absences. Say a kid is on pace to become chronically absent if they have missed five days of class or 10% of the learning time fifty days into the school year.
When their child’s attendance patterns in April or early May, 62% of parents reported that their child had missed no more than five days.
According to a March study by U.S.C. researchers, parental understanding of their child’s absences is expected. The survey indicated that just 47% of parents whose children were chronically absent” expressed worry.
Schools and districts should reach out to parents in ways they understand, especially when addressing children’s absenteeism. Morgan Polikoff, an education professor at U.S.C., stated this in an interview with Education Week. “They should endeavor to determine the root cause of absenteeism, which is likely to be among students.”
Excuses for Absences Accepted as Genuine, Including Illness and Safety Issues
Illness about students’ safety was the most commonly cited reason for students to skip school by parents. Some 51% of parents still think that sickness is a good reason to stay home, even though more and more schools are saying that kids should go to school remember, only if they are not a contagious disease and do not suffer from temperature. These results are timely, as studies of children’s well-being emphasize the need for school-wide initiatives to improve students’ attendance rates, such as mentoring programs, attendance campaigns, and the employment of social workers to help with issues like transportation that arise outside of school.
Parental support for or strong support of text and email campaigns, increased state funding for school nurses and counselors, and mandating in-person meetings between school staff and parents of chronically absent students were the most common responses among a menu of potential strategies to combat absenteeism.
