Massena Central School District addressing chronic absenteeism

“Prior to the pandemic, we were making significant strides to improve student attendance through stronger parent communication, classroom competitions, incentives, focus on classroom environment, and a variety of other strategies,” he told board of education members.

Now, he said, they’re trying a number of initiatives to get those numbers back down.

“The pandemic created significant barriers to attendance which have lingered in the post-pandemic phase,” Mr. Brady said. “We’ve seen the increase in the number of students who are not attending for whatever reason. Our goal this year has been to reinvigorate our previous work. So, this year we have been redoubling our efforts now that the pandemic seems to be in the rear-view mirror to once again start a deliberate campaign to get students to come to school.”

Chronic absenteeism, whether excused or unexcused, is defined as a student who misses 10% of the school year.

“That’s 18 days for the full school year because we have 180 days,” he said.

He said they’ve undertaken a number of initiatives to address chronic absenteeism, including making it a key strategic planning goal, tracking students who are chronically absent, and addressing it through the community schools initiative, social workers, Raider Academy, project-based learning and an enhanced intervention program.

In addition, Mr. Brady said, they want to address the school climate.

“Climate is all to create an environment where students want to be here or they have the resources that they feel comfortable being here,” he said.

Every school in the district has initiated a number of plans in the effort to keep students coming to school. At the high school, for instance, they include home visits and individual family/student engagement, parent conferences, culture-building activities and attendance incentives.

Mr. Brady said parent involvement was important. He said parents can talk about the importance of showing up to school every day, help their child maintain daily routines such as homework and getting a good night’s sleep, making sure the student has resources from school if they’re home sick, staying on top of social contacts, and finding out if their child feels safe at school and is engaged by their classes.

Being involved in sports or another extracurricular activity can give the student a sense of belonging, he said.

“Oftentimes when I’m dealing with students who are struggling, they don’t have a connection at school,” Mr. Brady said. “They’re not in a sport. They’re not in an extracurricular or in the community, being involved in organizations.”

Teachers can also play a key role by reaching out to students who are frequently absent to see if they can assist, by creating a nurturing, engaging classroom that encourages kids to come to school, and by encouraging families to partner with the school and community organizations to get needed support.

“Those are some of the work that we are doing this year to try to improve it, but it is a lot of work. It’s quite a bit of resources,” Mr. Brady said. “Because we are a high poverty area, that’s another statistic, that poverty areas tend to have more problems with attendance. We’ve seen the uptick in anxiety and other mental health issues with our students, and that’s another issue.”