Chronic absenteeism, or missing more than 10% of school days in an academic year, has all kinds of negative effects on students, including reduced academic achievement, increased social and behavioral challenges, increased dropout rates, and even poorer health outcomes over the long term. It has also been a pervasive and intractable challenge for educators.
Stoked by the pandemic, chronic absenteeism rates rose across the U.S. from 15% in 2018 to 28% in 2022, according to a report from the American Enterprise Institute. While chronic absenteeism rates dropped in 2023, they were still 75% higher than before the pandemic.
At Alexandria City Public Schools, we leaned into communication—beginning with listening to students and their families—to reduce chronic absenteeism. Here is how it worked.
Begin by inviting communication
It was really important for us to not only share and explain the benefits of regular school attendance but to also develop a shared understanding of the factors underlying chronic absenteeism.
To reach that shared understanding, my team in the Department of School & Community Relations engaged in some very intentional and collaborative work across the division that brought in members from our departments of accountability & research, student services & equity, technology services, teaching, learning & leadership and facilities & operations. It was an all-in approach that included building- and division-level leaders and staff.
We conduct annual surveys of students in grades 6-12, staff members, and families to gather perceptions of school and division climate. Other strategies that we used included teacher and family empathy interviews, parent/guardian focus groups and student community circles at the secondary level.
Empathy interviews use a series of open-ended questions, typically in a one-on-one conversation, to help draw out stories and perspectives that provide a richer context and understanding of needs. These interviews were annotated with key ideas and themes and were an incredible opportunity for us to better understand the context, background and influences that inform the drivers of absenteeism in our schools.
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The results were eye-opening. We found that some of our assumptions about why students were not showing up were inaccurate. At one particular elementary school, for example, there had been a widely held belief that a new bus route was needed in a specific neighborhood. It was within walking distance of the school, so, in line with division policy, the neighborhood did not get a bus route.
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Many educators at that school thought that transportation was going to be cited frequently by families as a big factor in their absenteeism rate. However, when we spoke with families, we found that many had ineffective or nonexistent morning routines, which led to both late arrivals and absences.
Another learning was that some teachers were not having regular conversations with families about the importance of attendance. Some were not comfortable having that conversation; others were accustomed to the school social worker or other student support team members addressing attendance issues with families.
Additionally, we noted that there were frequent misunderstandings among families about excused and unexcused absences and the impact that each has on a student’s academic, social and emotional learning. There was also a missed opportunity to provide secondary families with real-time notifications about student absences throughout the school day.
Make student attendance a shared responsibility
Conducting interviews with staff and families helped us broaden and deepen our understanding of the root causes behind chronic absenteeism and identify interventions that would have an impact there. We found an opportunity to improve communication between schools and families by leaning into the idea that this is an all-hands-on-deck issue that staff—including bus drivers and classroom teachers—should be bringing up with families whenever possible.
For us, building a culture around attendance and engagement included sharing positive messages that used family- and student-friendly language; increasing the frequency of absence notifications at the secondary level to help families partner with us to address attendance issues; and ensuring absence notifications are sent in families’ preferred languages—all through our communication app, ParentSquare. Beyond these communications, our school communities are implementing home visits, mentoring, incentives and family resource nights to engage students and families as partners in this work.
When our Superintendent Dr. Melanie Kay-Wyatt was appointed, she named student engagement and attendance as one of her key priorities, which informed the efforts we undertook. Dr. Kay-Wyatt introduced a new mantra across the division of “One Team, One Journey” which served as a backdrop to this work and drove the idea that all were critical to make an impact, especially the inclusion of student voice.
Students are not just an important constituency in this effort, but the people at the center of it, so it was critical their voices were included. Students helped create a three-part video series about the importance of attendance featuring student leaders from the secondary level. They focused on ideas like hanging out with friends, participating in activities students enjoy and gaining access to higher education and eventually better jobs.
Creating an all-hands-on-deck environment for us has also meant creating a division-wide task force that brought together division leaders and school principals for regular conversations about attendance data and trends. Of course, there are many ways we can talk about supporting attendance, but sometimes it is as simple as letting students and families know that they are loved, and their presence is valued.
