This past July, ASCD, a national curriculum organization, dedicated their monthly publication, EL, to strategies addressing student absenteeism and disconnection, with a focus on engaging learning experiences and open communication with families.
ASCD’s Editor-in-Chief Sarah McKibben introduces the issue with this short article:
“’Can we talk about chronic absenteeism?’ This title of a recent Reddit post grabbed my attention mid-scroll. As the teacher posing the question explained, she sees the ‘national headlines’ about the problem, but her district is in ‘complete denial.’ ‘How can we ‘build relationships’ with kids who are never there?’ she asked. The struggle to get kids to go to school and then actually attend class, she added, is like trying to keep ‘sand in a sieve all day long.’”
“Her frustration was palpable, and understandably so. Since the onset of the pandemic, chronic absenteeism has skyrocketed – and it’s taking a toll on student engagement and academic achievement. Why have so many students and families become disconnected from school? What can schools do to re-engage them?”
“While chronic absenteeism is a deeply complex issue, this digital edition of EL suggests that headway can be made. You’ll read about an initiative in the Richmond, Virginia school district that almost halved absenteeism rates in some building by shifting family engagement from ‘an isolated potluck into an essential strategy that foster[s] student achievement and two-way communication with families – on their terms.’”
“A recent NPR/Ipsos poll showed that just one-third of families can identify what chronic absenteeism actually is (missing 10 percent or mor of the school year). To ensure families understand how it impacts their children’s education, clear communication is essential. Todd Rogers and Karen Mapp, researchers at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and cofounders of EveryDay Labs, share students on the benefits of using more supportive and less punitive language in truancy notices and sending families personalized attendance ‘nudges.’”
“This issue is also packed with ideas on increasing students engagement so students want to show up and learn. For example, coauthors Amy Holcombe, dean of education at High Point University, and Steve Wozniak, cofounder of Apple, share AI activities (and sample prompts) that can help students be ‘active participants in their learning as opposed to passive recipients of information.’ Another article helps teachers keep ‘SCORE’ of key engagement factors, including student success, curiosity, originality, and interpersonal relationships.”
“As this issue of Educational Leadership shows, fixing the ‘sieve’ will take strategic work. But if the 500+ comments on the Reddit post are any indication, chronic absenteeism is front of mind for classroom teachers. Let’s make addressing it front of mind for states and districts, too, as preparation for the new school year gets underway.”
In addition to the articles McKibben mentions above, the July EL issue offers an article by the founder of Attendance Works, a nonprofit that serves at least 40 school districts in five U.S. states. That article encourages teachers to “warmly welcome students and families, ensure positive relationships, invest in home visits, provide engaging learning opportunities, and offer a supportive learning environment.”
Another article stresses the importance of using surveys to assess middle school students’ levels of engagement when it comes to teaching and learning.
Another article emphasizes the importance of utilizing discussion inside a classroom if you want to increase student engagement.
One article focuses on seeing students’ potential, expanding graduation pathways, and building teacher-student relationships.
All of this is well and good I guess, but it was part of Aleta Margolis’s article that caught my attention. Margolis is founder and president of Center for Inspired Teaching, an organization dedicated to transforming the school experience for students from compliance-based to engagement-based. Margolis writes:
“While there are situations in which students are forced to miss school because they need to care for siblings at home or face other external barriers that make it difficult or impossible to attend, the primary reasons for student absenteeism, according to decades of research, are not these external situations that ‘pull’ them out of school. Instead, students are ‘pushed’ out by school-based factors that make school unpleasant (Doll et al, 2013).”
“How many children could attend school, but frankly, don’t want to due to negative school environments or a lack of connection to their teachers and peers? A report from CASEL found that ‘more than 8 in 10 recent high school students say they felt bored at school at least some of the time’ (DePaoli et al., 2018). Young people, like all people, don’t want to go places where they don’t feel engaged. If they find school to be a place where their thoughts, ideas, and interests are not particularly valued, can we blame them for not showing up?”
Based on my time visiting our traditional K-12 classrooms, there were too many times when student looks pleaded with me “Please take me with you” when I exited a room. I often times wonder how many traditional students we would lose in our public schools if states got rid of their compulsory attendance laws (all 50 states have them)?
Our public school system has lost 1.5 million students since the COVID pandemic. True, the number of state laws enacted giving families increased choice to send their kids somewhere other than public school has increase dramatically, but common sense must tell us not all of those 1.5 million are headed to private school.
No, the reality is that many of our current public school students are “voting with their feet,” meaning they have had enough of the boring curriculum and instruction, too many tests, and little connection to their interests or their futures, and walking out the door and not coming back.
Til tomorrow. SVB
A Better Path to Learning 
Leave a comment