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MEDFORD, Mass. (AP) \u2014 Flerentin \u201cFlex\u201d Jean-Baptiste missed so much school he had to repeat his freshman year at Medford High outside Boston. At school, \u201cyou do the same thing every day,\u201d said Jean-Baptiste, who was absent 30 days his first year. \u201cThat gets very frustrating.\u201d<\/p>\n
Then his principal did something nearly unheard of: She let students play organized sports during lunch \u2014 if they attended all their classes. In other words, she offered high schoolers recess.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt gave me something to look forward to,\u201d said Jean-Baptiste, 16. The following year, he cut his absences in half. Schoolwide, the share of chronically absent students declined from 35% in March 2023 to 23% in March 2024 \u2014 one of the steepest declines among Massachusetts high schools.<\/p>\n
Years after COVID-19 upended American schooling, nearly every state is\u00a0still struggling with attendance<\/a>, according to data collected by The Associated Press and Stanford University economist Thomas Dee.<\/p>\n Roughly one in four students in the 2022-23 school year remained chronically absent, meaning they missed at least 10% of the school year. That represents about 12 million children in the 42 states and Washington, D.C., where data is available.<\/p>\n Before the pandemic, only 15% of students missed that much school.<\/p>\n Society may have largely moved on from COVID, but schools say they\u2019re still battling the effects of\u00a0pandemic school closures<\/a>. After as much as a year at home, school for many kids has felt overwhelming, boring or socially stressful. More than ever, kids and parents are deciding it\u2019s OK to stay home, which makes catching up even harder.<\/p>\n In all but one state, Arkansas, absence rates remain higher than they were pre-pandemic. Still, the problem appears to have passed its\u00a0peak<\/a>; almost every state saw absenteeism improve at least slightly from 2021-22 to 2022-23.<\/p>\n Schools are working to identify students with slipping attendance, then providing help. They\u2019re working to close communication gaps with parents, who often aren\u2019t aware their child is missing so much school or\u00a0why it\u2019s problematic<\/a>.<\/p>\n So far, the solutions that appear to be helping are simple \u2014 like postcards to parents that compare a child\u2019s attendance with peers. But to make more progress, experts say, schools must get creative to address their students\u2019 needs.<\/p>\n In Oakland, California, chronic absenteeism skyrocketed from 29% pre-pandemic to 53% in 2022-23 across district and charter schools. Officials asked students what would convince them to come to class.<\/p>\n Money, they replied, and a mentor.<\/p>\n A grant-funded program launched in spring 2023 paid 45 students $50 weekly for perfect attendance. Students also checked in daily with an assigned adult and completed weekly mental health assessments.<\/p>\n Paying students isn\u2019t a permanent or sustainable fix, said Zaia Vera, the district\u2019s head of social-emotional learning.<\/p>\n But many absent students\u00a0lacked stable housing<\/a>\u00a0or were helping to support their families. \u201cThe money is the hook that got them in the door,\u201d Vera said.<\/p>\n More than 60% improved their attendance after taking part, Vera said. The program is expected to continue, along with district-wide efforts aimed at creating a sense of belonging. Oakland\u2019s African American Male Achievement project, for example, pairs Black students with Black teachers who offer support.<\/p>\n Kids\u00a0who identify with their educators<\/a>\u00a0are more likely to attend school, said Michael Gottfried, a University of Pennsylvania professor. According to\u00a0one study led by Gottfried,<\/a>\u00a0California students felt \u201cit\u2019s important for me to see someone who\u2019s like me early on, first thing in the day,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n A caring teacher made a difference for Golden Tachiquin, 18, who graduated from Oakland\u2019s Skyline High School this spring. When she started 10th grade after a remote freshman year, she felt lost and anxious. She later realized these feelings caused the nausea and dizziness that kept her home sick. She was absent at least 25 days that year.<\/p>\n But she bonded with an Afro-Latina teacher who understood her culturally and made Tachiquin, a straight-A student, feel her poor attendance didn\u2019t define her.<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t dread going to her class,\u201d Tachiquin said.<\/p>\n Another teacher had\u00a0the opposite effect<\/a>. \u201cShe would say, \u2018Wow, guess who decided to come today?\u2019 \u201d Tachiquin recalled. \u201cI started skipping her class even more.\u201d<\/p>\n In Massachusetts, Medford High School requires administrators to greet and talk with students each morning, especially those with a history of missing school.<\/p>\n But the lunchtime gym sessions have been the biggest driver of improved attendance, Principal Marta Cabral said. High schoolers need freedom and an opportunity to move their bodies, she said. \u201cThey\u2019re here for seven hours a day. They should have a little fun.\u201d<\/p>\n Chronically absent students are at higher risk of\u00a0illiteracy<\/a>\u00a0and eventually\u00a0dropping out<\/a>. They also miss the meals,\u00a0counseling<\/a>\u00a0and socialization provided at school.<\/p>\n Many of the reasons kids missed school early in the pandemic are still firmly in place:\u00a0financial hardship<\/a>,\u00a0transportation<\/a>\u00a0problems,\u00a0mild illness<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0mental health<\/a>\u00a0struggles.<\/p>\n In Alaska, 45% of students missed significant school last year. In Amy Lloyd\u2019s high school classes in Juneau, some families now treat attendance as optional. Last term, several of her English students missed school for vacations.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t really know how to reset the expectation that was crushed when we sat in front of the computer for that year,\u201d Lloyd said.<\/p>\n Emotional and behavioral problems also have kept kids home from school. Research\u00a0shared exclusively with AP<\/a>\u00a0found absenteeism and poor mental health are \u201cinterconnected,\u201d said University of Southern California professor Morgan Polikoff.<\/p>\n For example, in the USC study, almost a quarter of chronically absent kids had high levels of emotional or behavioral problems, according to a parent questionnaire, compared with just 7% of kids with good attendance.\u00a0Emotional symptoms among teen girls<\/a>\u00a0were especially linked with missing school.<\/p>\nCaring adults \u2014 and incentives<\/h4>\n
Stubborn circumstances<\/h4>\n
How sick is too sick?<\/h4>\n