Fall means back to (skipping) school for too many students

It’s that time of year again, as K-12 students return to classrooms across the state. But for a troubling number of students, the annual fall ritual means back to skipping school much of the time.

Students who miss more than ten percent of class time get flagged for chronic absenteeism. The number of students who chronically skip school remains shockingly high, as the Star Tribune points out.

About three-fourths of Minnesota’s students consistently attended class in 2022-23, an increase of roughly 5 percentage points from the year before, according to recently released state data. But the rate of repeated absences has remained higher than in pre-pandemic years and has risen alarmingly high for some demographic groups.

A new legislative study group is working to identify solutions and a dozen school districts across the state have started meeting monthly to share ideas and data as part of a three-year pilot program.

Efforts to boost attendance in other districts include expanding intervention programs and hiring social workers dedicated to reducing absences. Other schools are encouraging students to get involved in extracurricular activities and increasing messaging to families about why regular attendance is important.

Not surprisingly, students who cut classes regularly stand a lower chance of graduating. Mankato Public Schools will be one of the districts participating in the pilot program to tackle absenteeism this academic year. The Free Press notes that 30 percent of the nearly 7,500 students in the southern Minnesota district were chronically absent from school in 2022-23.

[Mankato Public Schools] Director of Student Support Services Scott Hare told staff during Tuesday’s meeting that initial work has involved focusing on why students aren’t coming to school.

“The administrators have gone through their list, taking a look at some of the reasons. Then we look at working with the county, with the school staff trying to look at what tools do we have to get kids in school,” he said.

“We’re in that process of trying to funnel down to the gap as to what are we missing and how are we engaging students and the families to get kids in school?”

Parents can be held responsible for ensuring their children up to the age of 12 get to class. While regularly missing school significantly impacts students across the board, the rate of absenteeism rises among those living in poverty, as well as among Hispanic, black and Latino students.

Peterson told The Free Press before the meeting that the district is approaching attendance with an all hands on deck mindset.

“While it will take different strategies to get to the root of those issues, we know that transportation is something that we will need to continue to be thinking creatively about,” he said.

“The outreach for families, so if a kid is gone from school on a day, and maybe it turns into two days … outreach, not only with phone calls and emails, but in some cases those are home visits. Showing up, talking with caregivers about how can the school be of assistance.”

State law also gives county attorney offices the authority to set up truancy intervention programs to deal with students over the age of 12. So far, however, there’s little indication of the outcome of these initiatives and their effectiveness in keeping students in school.