Date & Time: Wednesday, April 29, 2026 at 2 p.m. ET
Most districts are following required attendance protocols: sending notices, logging contacts, and meeting compliance benchmarks. But those steps alone aren’t driving sustained improvement. The districts seeing real results are going further: reaching families early with personalized, timely outreach and building the trust that brings students back.
Garden Grove USD and San Lorenzo USD are two such examples of this, having reduced chronic absenteeism for three consecutive years.
In this 45-minute webinar, student services and attendance leaders from these districts will share what drove their results and what others can replicate to improve attendance in their own communities.
Bonus: Attendees who join the live event will be able to participate in a ThoughtExchange workshop to share and rank family engagement best practices from their peers to boost attendance.***
Key Takeaways
- Family Engagement That Works: What effective proactive, relationship-based outreach looks like—and how to measure its impact
- The Critical Outreach Window: When leaders can build family trust and stabilize attendance before the school year closes—and the steps to take right now
- Beyond the Compliance Model: What these districts did beyond notices, contact logs, and passive follow-up
- The “Playbook” After Elementary School: What re-engagement looks like for middle and high school students—and what actually brings them back
- Serving ELL & ECD Families: Strategies for reducing chronic absenteeism in communities with large populations of English Language Learners and economically disadvantaged families
- ***Live 5-minute Workshop: Audience participation will generate reports showing the common ground and differences among district leaders, the summary of highest and lowest rated best practices, the top themes, potential next steps, and a SWOT analysis
The difference isn’t more outreach. It’s knowing which students need more than a message, acting early, and building the connections that bring them back.
Speakers
Marvin Atkins, Jr., Student Services, Garden Grove Unified School District (CA)
Rocio Gonzalez-Romero, Attendance & Truancy, San Lorenzo Unified School District (CA)
Dr. Kara Stern, Director of Education, SchoolStatus
Sponsored by
