Addressing Chronic Absence : Tracking Chronic Absence for Drop-out Prevention

We've often said that tracking chronic absence is an essential ingredient in reducing high school drop-out rates. Attention to absences in the early grades can keep vulnerable students on track and help them build good attendance habits that will carry them through their school years and beyond.

A story in USA Today last week describes a Philadelphia middle school where a program called Diplomas Now is working to turn around attendance problems before students reach high school.

Here's their approach to reaching absentee students:

"[Adam] Jackson punches in the home number of one absent student and stands silently while he waits for someone to pick up.

Finally he introduces himself and, in a soft, deferential voice, says, "I was wondering if Isaiah's going to be in today, or if everything's OK? 'Cause I didn't see him."

Not exactly the typical scolding call from a truant officer. But day after day, calls like that have helped to boost Feltonville's average daily attendance....

Moments later — and armed with a list of 11 chronically absent students — a pair of in-house social workers will climb into a weathered silver Honda Accord and begin driving around the neighborhood, knocking on doors."

Diplomas Now, building off the work of Johns Hopkins education researcher Robert Balfanz, collects data on attendance, behavior and grades in English and math--key early warning signs of drop-out risk. They create spreadsheets of at-risk students and bring in volunteers to tutor and mentor children, offer afterschool programs and link them to social workers.

We endorse these sorts of efforts. We also encourage schools and districts to look for patterns in absences that can help address attendance in systemic ways. Are there neighborhoods, schools or classrooms where attendance is particularly bad? Do the patterns suggest programmatic interventions that help reduce absences due to poorly conceived discipline policies, lack of access to health services, problems with neighborhood safety or unreliable public transportation?