How Urban and Rural School Districts Aim to Address Alarming Absenteeism Rates

And the challenges are a priority for many area educators, Terry says.

So how are they responding?

Try the long jump

Some districts say they have really tried to make reducing missing school rates for homeless students a priority.

The Poway Unified School District, located in San Diego with more than 35,000 students, has a chronic absenteeism rate of 15.7 percent, according to data from the California Department of Education.

The district has really made a concerted effort to ensure students are attending school, says Mercedes Hubschmitt, the district’s director of learning support services and homeless liaison.

Chronic absenteeism is not caused by the same problem for everyone, he says. It’s specific. So solving it requires the district to be aware of students’ real needs and carefully plan steps to resolve any obstacles those students face, she says.

As? Poway runs attendance reports and investigates why students don’t show up. District staff conduct “home visits” and sit down with families to determine what obstacles they have. What they’ve learned, Hubschmitt says, is that homeless students are missing out on things most people take for granted. The most common problem? It’s the physical part of getting kids to class. That’s why the district runs bus routes, hands out cards that allow free use of public transportation and, in some cases, offers gas rebates to families. Leaders are also working with companies like HopSkipDrive, a ride-sharing company that takes students to school.

But Poway is also trying many approaches similar to other San Diego districts. There are programs that provide limited time in hotels to stabilize housing. There are also attempts to give students access to clean clothing, for example through access to laundry machines.

Other San Diego districts tell EdSurge they are increasing training in trauma-informed care, providing more tutoring for homeless students, and focusing on college and career planning and counseling, which sometimes include field trips to college campuses.

The hope is that these solutions will help address the unique challenges homeless students face.

“After COVID, I think we all went through different things. And I think things may have emerged that didn’t exist before, around health and priorities and access. So our team is really focused on trying to make sure our kids have what they need to be successful,” says Hubschmitt, of Poway.

Another obstacle: health care.

Disparities in who has access to health care are cited in reports such as the San Diego Foundation’s as one of the reasons whites in the city live an average of five years longer than blacks.

For homeless students, this can mean more untreated illnesses in the family.

Poway has tried to adapt. The district uses a grant to give out Uber gift cards that students’ families use to get to their medical appointments, Hubschmitt says.

think small

For rural areas, the situation seems different.

Kellie Burns, executive director of Yavapai Housing School District #99, believes her staff can connect personally with students.
Theirs is a small district, in central Arizona, with only 90 students. The dozen district employees hand out their personal phone numbers to students and take them to school. When those students are absent, staff calls and texts them, even showing up at their homes. Sometimes, Burns says, staff even track students at their jobs.

The extra effort forges one-on-one connections with students, Burns maintains. It’s those relationships that can keep students walking through doors when they don’t want to, according to attendance experts. But it’s probably not practical for large urban districts, Burns acknowledges.

During the pandemic, the number of chronically absent homeless students in the Burns district skyrocketed. It was more than 50 percent in 2020. But it has decreased: It is now only “slightly higher” than before the pandemic, Burns says.
In percentage terms, the number of chronically absent students in Yavapai is actually close to official figures for urban areas like San Diego. Yavapai’s chronic absenteeism rate has been 31.9 percent so far this year, according to figures submitted to EdSurge in November.

But although the number of homeless students in the district has increased, only about 9 percent are chronically absent, Burns reports.

And others in rural areas have noticed a similar pattern.

Fewer homeless students are chronically absent in rural areas because it’s harder for them to hide, says Tina Goar, senior education specialist for rural initiatives at Generation Schools Network, a nonprofit that partners with schools to create “school ecosystems.” healthy.”

Rural areas tend to have fewer students overall, and that allows districts to really get to know homeless students, he says, reflecting specifically on his own experience with rural Colorado schools.

What the rural districts she knows find most difficult is providing social services.

Rural areas depend on connections to large cities and towns to finance social support. When it comes to finding social workers, housing assistance or job training, Goar says, “It’s a challenge.” And that’s what the schools Goar works with say they want, in addition to specific solutions to chronic absenteeism.

Catch up

Yavapai, the district where Burns works, is an alternative school. Plus, it only works with high school students, most of whom are far behind in credits toward graduation, usually more than a year, Burns says.

These students also tend to have been in trouble with the law, be caregivers, or have physical, emotional, or mental issues they face, he adds. Because of this, they are often not very interested in school.

About 75 percent of students who dropped out during the pandemic aged out of the system and never returned to school, Burns says.

When the pandemic hit, Burns says, most of those students got full-time jobs in fast food, construction or landscaping. For students, it may seem like good money, making them more reluctant to leave those jobs to return to school, Burns says. These students tend not to return to earn their diploma or GED.

But some other students are lured back.

They face another challenge, Burns says: They often don’t have the foundation they need to succeed in higher grades. They have missed a lot of class time. So even though they got promoted, they now have to deal with the frustration of that lost learning. This can cause depression or defiance. Burns says he spends much of his time trying to get these students up to the level they would be at if they had stayed in school.

“If you tell them ‘you’re not a failure just because you’re behind,’ they’re more likely to try and focus more on their school,” Burns says. But ultimately it may depend on the support system the student has at home.

Are they permanently behind? Burns is optimistic. “Everyone can catch up. We will take them there,” he says. It helps that Arizona doesn’t exclude a student from school until age 22, he adds. That can buy you more time.

Burns says showing compassion for these students and establishing a connection with them is key. She tells them, “You have more time to do this. You’re not a failure just because you graduated later than you thought you were going to graduate when you entered kindergarten.”