Chronic Absenteeism

We caught up with our Executive Assistant, Rinda Estes, to ask her why students are absent, here’s what she had to say!

Why are students absent?

“There are many reasons why students don’t come to school and they are usually very individualized reasons. Usually chronic absenteeism is predicated on the individual student and their family, and what they’re family is experiencing that produces chronic absences for that child.”

More and more students are reporting traumatic events that are impacting their lives, making them more fragile, their needs higher, and the need for resources higher to address these events.

A very large portion of families we’re working with live in survival mode; they’re not in a position where they’re thinking long term, they may need emergency assistance in some cases, they’re often thinking about what they need to do to keep a roof over their heads. Students in transition, who may be experiencing homelessness can often experience chronic absenteeism.

Pregnant and parenting teens may not come to school. Often daycare for parenting teens can become an issue and affect a student’s presence in school. Perhaps a teen parent has a sick child that they have to stay home with…

Some of our kids become ill during the school semester. Many of these students do not have a primary caregiver, so we connect those basic resources to students like making sure parents have information about how to access a primary caregiver, this can also include providing parents with information about health insurance.

Perhaps a student has a family member with a severe health issue, or just recently experienced the loss of a loved one or another traumatic event. Many times, a student in this situation feels like they need to go to work during the school day in order to help support their family and subsidize their family income. Often times, in these situations, the student may also experience a significant amount of grief.

Domestic violence is another example of something that a child may be experiencing which makes it difficult for them to come to school. Or, they may be able to get to school but have a hard time focusing because something has happened the night before.

Do you think that student absenteeism is becoming greater or that chronic absenteeism is decreasing?

“I do believe that chronic absenteeism is becoming greater. Families are facing challenges, and needs are becoming greater, and families are becoming more fragile.”

What can we do to help our students facing chronic absenteeism?

“It is our responsibility to link resources to these students, make sure families understand what resources are available to support them. For example, providing counseling services to a student who experienced a traumatic event, or linking other community resources to a student during a time of need”

We also need to respond proactively instead of reactively.

It is important that we have a holistic approach, no matter what the reason is for absenteeism, that we use a holistic approach when helping families and students be more present in school.

When CIS is in schools, 99% of our students stay in school https://cisnational.org/4781Q9o.