Licking County school districts become pro-active to boost post pandemic attendance
NEWARK ― Mainly because of COVID-related issues, chronic absenteeism for Ohio students rose to 30% during 2021-22, according to the Ohio Department of Education.
Chronic absenteeism, defined as missing 10% of the school year, averaged out at 24.9% among Licking County's 10 districts last school year. But Jeff Gill, attendance officer for the Licking County Educational Service Center, said the numbers are improving thus far for this school year, as districts are actively dealing with the issue.
One such case is at Heath High School, which from Sept.1-Sept. 30, 2021, reported 2,177 absences. During the same time this year, it fell to 1,065. Gill was encouraged.
"An absence 'event' is anything from excused to unexcused, not just skipping school," he said. "We should quit focusing on truancy exclusively and look at attendance. There was no additional truancy last year, but more absence. Instead of kids missing two to four days, it was 10-12."
Heath had one of the county's highest absenteeism rates last year at 35.6%, second to only Newark's 39.3%. Superintendent Trevor Thomas said the district has taken several measures to address the problem. A lot of the absences were due to COVID isolation and quarantine requirements. At the start of last year, students were required to isolate for 10 days if they had COVID, and close contacts were required to quarantine for 10 days from the date of exposure.
"We documented every one of those absences correctly, and each absence that students were required to miss school, counted toward this calculation," Thomas said. "Furthermore, there were two time periods during the school year where COVID cases were elevated in students and staff, to the point it was difficult to continue to have school (though we did, as always). In addition to the absences caused by COVID, I believe we also got into some habits of missing school more than during pre-pandemic times. It is a challenge to return to pre-pandemic times where attendance, deadlines, getting up and going to school and work are the normal expectation."
Heath is working closely with administrators, truancy officers and the court system to emphasize attendance, Thomas said.
"First, we have shared with students the importance of school attendance, and how it directly affects student achievement," Thomas said. "We are implementing attendance interventions, and meeting with families proactively to communicate this expectation. We believe that we will improve student attendance, and as a result it will improve student mental health and academic achievement."
Newark's rise in absenteeism was also COVID-related, for the same reasons Thomas gave, but the 2022-23 numbers are improving, superintendent David Lewis said.
"This year, the requirements have changed, and students are missing far fewer days due to COVID currently," Lewis said. "The district also expanded online offerings and outreach for students through COVID, and we were extra cautious when tracking student attendance during online sessions. We are seeing better attendance figures through the first quarter."
For the two years prior to 2020, Newark's chronic absenteeism rate was about 21%, before rising up to 39% last year.
"Those percentages do include students who miss for any reason, including health-related reasons, but it is still higher than we would like it to be," Lewis said. "Our district is always searching for ways to connect students to their schools and encourage success. We have been able to add our fifth elementary After School Adventures program this year, at John Clem, and also host the programs at two middle schools and the high school."
Newark attendance officers are also working with the Licking County Juvenile Court and Judge Deborah Lang on a pilot program to encourage attendance. The attendance officers and court officials are meeting with students and their families to develop an attendance plan. "This program just began, and we hope it will have an impact on student attendance and school success," Lewis said.
Other school numbers
Other Licking County districts chronic absenteeism numbers from last year show Lakewood at 33.1%, North Fork 27.1%, Northridge 26.5%, Johnstown 24%, Licking Heights 20%, Southwest Licking 19.4%, Licking Valley 14.7% and Granville 9.6%. Most districts are also seeing those numbers come down.
"The past two years have been challenging," said Northridge superintendent Scott Schmidt. "Many of the absences were due to student or family illnesses. We know that in order for students to be learning from their teachers, they need to be in class.
"This school year, we have renewed our focus on improving attendance rates by educating both students and parents about the importance of attending school daily," Schmidt added. "These efforts seem to be working, and we are seeing fewer students' absences so far this year. The importance of attendance will continue to be a focus as we work to support students and families in creating good habits of daily attendance."
Granville's number is an increase from years past, due to pandemic quarantine and isolation, but it's still relatively low, and superintendent Jeff Brown anticipates it will keep dropping. He said keeping the rate low is a collaboration and partnership between parents, students and staff.
"A lot of the issues that we have related to absenteeism in general are related to experiences families are taking," Brown said. "For the 10th through 12th graders, they will be gone because of college visits and other things, trying to get a sense of where they are going next in life. Whatever the unique circumstance is, we try and work collaboratively to get those students back in school and get back on their feet."
"When we do have situations where students are struggling to get to school, the school’s attendance officer, Jeff Gill, does a fantastic job of reaching out and trying to get to the bottom of what might be the issues," Brown added.
Poverty impact
A breakdown of last year's statewide numbers showed that urban school districts, like Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, Akron and Canton, have the highest rates of chronic absenteeism, and in some cases, they were triple or quadruple their suburban counterparts. The 30 percent statewide chronic absenteeism rate showed 24 percent of students were white, but it doubled for Black kids.
About 44% of economically disadvantaged students were chronically absent. And students with learning disabilities were at 40%. "The barriers to attendance are correlated with poverty," Brittany Miracle, state education assistant director who focuses on attendance, told the Columbus Dispatch for a recent article.
"The factor I work with, all the time, is that lower income families have much higher rates of absence in the last two years because many, many more of them live in multi-generational households, three and even four generations (great-grandmas to babies)," Gill said. "These households had COVID positivity run through their residence multiple times last year; I just worked with a family where the middle school student was out, excused and unexcused, but a total of a third of last year. The core reason was because they had COVID four times in various family members.
"A household with two parents and one or two children will not have this level of hazard. That's why you see higher absenteeism, which is both excused and unexcused, in lower income households, neighborhoods, and districts," Gill added.
Getting a jump in 2022
Gill said that last year's attendance problems, and having to deal with them, gave Licking County districts incentive to get a jump on this year. He is responsible for Heath, Licking Valley, North Fork and Granville, and also has a close view of Licking Heights and Southwest Licking.
"They did a lot of work over the summer," he said. "So they went over what happened last year, and were able to say, 'Here's what we want to happen this year.' The problem during COVID was, total absence up, and they needed to figure out what to do."
Gill said districts are addressing attendance as a key value (not just chasing truancy issues) for all students, getting ahead of known issues in some cases, while also engaging students on COVID recovery, in a mix of teacher assessments and general testing to see where they have fallen behind.
A study done by Ohio State professor Vladimir Kogan found that statewide math scores, for middle and high school students, continue to decline, while pandemic learning losses for English are more on track to recover. Gill is encouraged that Licking County districts may even be ahead of schedule.
"I think we’re much closer to getting almost all students back on track pre-March 2020 than I thought we could a year ago, and it most assuredly has been a team effort," he said at the end of September, in a letter to county superintendents. "Time and attention given by attendance secretaries, building administrators, counseling staff, teachers, and also from parents who are appreciating why we’re pushing a little bit more strongly on things like student absence. Everybody gets it that we lost some ground, and we don’t want to let things drag along. But a moderate picking up of the pace is getting everyone back on the path: that’s what I’m seeing."
All of this, excused or unexcused, 10 days missed or 20 days absent, adds up to poorer educational outcomes, Gill said. "And I can report that everyone in each school building across Licking County is constantly thinking about how we can bridge that gap of the last two years and complete COVID recovery. It's already happening; we're not there yet, but the work is well under way and we'remaking progress."
Advocate reporter Maria DeVito contributed to this story.
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This article originally appeared on Newark Advocate: Districts become pro-active; Licking County attendance numbers improve
