Author & moderator:  Emily Paisner, Senior Director of Marketing, Daybreak Health

Panelists: 

• Lorri Hobson, Director of Product Development, Attendance Works
• Dr. Anthony Jackson, Superintendent, Chatham County Schools in North Carolina
• Dr. Martha Salazar-Zamora, Superintendent, Tomball Independent School District (ISD) in Texas
• Dr. Ian Roberts, Superintendent, Des Moines Public Schools in Iowa
• Dr. Devika Bhushan, Chief Medical Officer, Daybreak Health

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Nationwide, chronic absenteeism—missing 10 percent or more of school days—is at an all-time high. As of the 2022-23 school year, over one-quarter of U.S. students in kindergarten through 12th-grade missed a month or more of the school year, which is double the rate recorded pre-Covid-19. 

Daybreak brought together champions and experts on this issue to discuss this crisis in K-12 education and how we can help solve it, together. 

Here’s what our panel of Superintendents and mental health experts shared:

1. Understand the “Why” 

This problem existed pre-pandemic and has only been exacerbated. Prior to the pandemic, 8 million students were identified nationally as being chronically absent. Post-pandemic is even more alarming as 14.7 million students are chronically absent. 

‍“A number of the reasons for chronically absent kids has to do with all too treatable health conditions, ranging from infections, asthma, diabetes, chronic pain, dental issues, depression, ADHD … all of which are truly addressable and these absences are preventable,” said Dr. Devika Bhushan, Daybreak Health’s Chief Medical Officer. But, she shared that other contributing factors to chronic absenteeism include: mental health challenges amongst family members, unstable housing, and transportation issues.

Unlike truancy, there are a myriad of reasons why students may be absent, shared Lorri Hobson, Director of Product Development for Attendance Works, a non-governmental organization that promotes school attendance awareness. There are kids taking care of younger siblings. Kids who have to go out and supplement jobs. The list of reasons why kids are missing school goes on. But the impact of these absences is palpable. “What we’re seeing is that students across the country are less likely to read on track by 3rd grade, they’re not scaffolding up and achieving in middle school, and they’re not likely to graduate on time,” she says. 

Chronically absent students are at higher risk of poor educational outcomes and we know that education and health go hand-in-hand. Missing school is about more than future unemployment or even anxiety and depression. "It’s also a question of unrealized life potential." Dr. Bhushan shared, “Chronic absenteeism predicts school failure better than test scores.”

We must keep in mind that a penalty system is not the appropriate response to students who are chronically absent. Hobson said, “We have to remove the judgment. We have to step away and step back and open the opportunity for parents to share and for families to be vulnerable enough with us to share their ‘why’.” Until we get to the root cause of why our families are chronically absent, we will not be able to solve this. 

Some of Attendance Works research shows that preventing absenteeism boils down to four pillars: health and safety, belonging and connection, academic rigor, and psychological support.

“Chronic absenteeism is everyone's business,” stated Dr. Ian Roberts, Superintendent of Des Moines Public Schools in Iowa. “If we do not address chronic absenteeism with a systemic approach, we are going to perpetuate the kind of mediocre performance we're seeing in all of our students in terms of their academic achievement, academic outcomes.”

2. Engage & Influence Policy to Reduce Inequities

Chronic absenteeism overwhelmingly affects students from marginalized backgrounds and is the leading cause of educational inequity. Kids from low socio-economic neighborhoods, kids with disabilities, kids who identify as LGBTQI+, and kids of color are less likely to be in school, and from a very young age. 

“Chronic absenteeism is on the verge of becoming a major civil rights issue,” Dr. Roberts shared. “It doesn't matter how incredibly amazing of an academic program we have in place, if students don't have their butts in seats, then the learning is not going to happen.”

Our panelists discussed the importance of implementing and influencing policy to address chronic absenteeism in the same way as they would for reading and math. Include legislators and community partners in discussions around student mental health programs so they are invested in funding improved outcomes. It doesn’t matter how amazing a school’s academic program is—when chronic absenteeism continues, so does the cycle of poverty. 

3. Create a Supportive and Inclusive Community

“What we see are kids who are literally craving relationships. They're craving relationships with their peers. They're craving relationships with adults. They're craving relationships with family. And they're craving all kinds of just interactions that the pandemic normalized not having,” said Dr. Anthony Jackson, Superintendent of Chatham County Schools in North Carolina. “In our schools, we have to be so very intentional about looking at both sides of this equation. While we're looking at the kids who are craving the relationships, I need to also be looking at the adults who are equally as impacted.”

Students are longing for a place to belong and they want their voices to be heard. “When students feel like they don’t have a voice, they can’t bring their whole selves to school,” Hobson said. (Attendance Works has a free, two-page handout to help parents understand the link between anxiety and absenteeism.)  

Dr. Martha Salazar-Zamora, Superintendent of Tomball ISD in Texas shared that families in her district attend ‘Parent University’ to learn how to talk to their kids about mental health. Creative solutions such as these help build bridges that keep families healthy, and keep kids in school. And school is where the most effective and comprehensive support is available.  

Schools must also invest in teacher well-being in order to create solvable approaches to address absenteeism. Educators can have an enormous effect on school attendance. “I know I went to school because I had great teachers,” Dr. Jackson pointed out. 

Dr. Roberts also highlighted the importance of creating spaces where teachers feel supported. That’s not just physical safety but also social and emotional safety. Because when teachers are disengaged from the system, students become disengaged, too. There’s a direct correlation between teacher attendance and student absenteeism.

Dr. Salazar-Zamora emphasized the role district leaders have in fostering a collaborative culture. “If you have people, if you have a tribe, if you have that network of support, then a lot of [great] things can happen,” she said. 

4. Build Multi-Tiered Systems of Support 

Because chronic absenteeism is the leading cause of educational inequity, we must solve it using multi-tiered systems of support (MTSS) in our schools. All of our panelists stressed the importance of integrating MTSS and community programs to minimize the impact of mental health issues. 

After experiencing the tragic loss of several students to suicide over the past year, Dr. Salazar-Zamora remains committed to breaking the mental health stigma in her community so that “people aren’t worried, ashamed, or embarrassed to talk about.” Tomball ISD has put Tier 1 several supports in place like The Hope Squad to help students via peer-to-peer engagement.

During the discussion, Dr. Jackson talked about Tier 1 interventions as ones that every student deserves and is entitled to. He called out that, “We recognized that we went from what everybody was entitled to [Tier 1 supports], to the most severe [Tier 3 supports]...and we had nothing in between.” 

Dr. Jackson shared how Daybreak’s teletherapy program helped Chatham County—which covers just over 700 square miles—put Tier 2 interventions in place and overcome the geographical challenges of reaching kids who aren’t at school, especially those in rural areas. “What we realized was that we were almost playing a game of roulette with who got the services simply based on geography. If you were close to the population centers, the universities, and the service providers you got services a lot faster.” 

Teletherapy has allowed Chatham County to increase their Tier 2 interventions so that all students and families can get support as quickly as possible, regardless of their physical location. These interventions have made their Tier 3 supports more impactful because students who are in need of more intensive services can get it faster.

“This program has made a tremendous impact for us in a very short period of time. And not only am I hearing that from our parents, I'm hearing it from our student support staff as well," said Dr. Jackson. “We are now able to serve families outside of school time, which means that we're seeing that kids are getting back to school. We're already seeing a decline in the number of kids who are chronically absent.”

“We know that kids are six times more likely to get mental health care when it's offered through schools and that such services will not only improve attendance but will actually move the needle on health and educational outcomes that really matter,” Dr. Bhushan said. 

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Additional resources that were mentioned:

• The Anxious Generation: Author, Jonathan Haidt 
• Hope Squad: Dr. Salazar-Zamora discussed this peer-to-peer suicide prevention program built around the power of connection that was implemented at Tomball ISD
• The Four Pillars that Can Impact Attendance: Attendance Works
• The Link Between School Attendance and Good Health: American Academy of Pediatrics
• School Attendance, Truancy & Chronic Absenteeism: What Parents Need to Know: Healthy Children.org
• School Avoidance: Tips for Concerned Parents: Healthy Children.org
• Back-to-School Mental Health Toolkit: Daybreak Health

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