In this Big Bets Working session, the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading (CGLR) hosted a conversation with practitioners working at the school, district, community and state levels to hear how they are partnering with families to overcome attendance barriers and make attendance a priority strategy for nurturing early school success.

“Positive family engagement is foundational to a shared understanding of why attendance matters and for building partnerships [that will help] to overcome barriers to attendance.” – Francisco Baires, Capitol Region Education Council, CT

Hedy Chang of Attendance Works kicked off the discussion by sharing recent data from states that shows chronic absence rates are declining modestly, but the country still has an unprecedented attendance crisis that affects nearly one out of three students. Elementary schools are especially impacted. The number of elementary schools with extreme levels of chronic absence (30%+ chronic absence rate) in the 2021–22 school year was nearly 20,000, which is a jump from approximate 3,550 schools before the pandemic. “This means we have to partner with families to ensure and, in many cases, restore positive conditions for learning that really help make sure kids and their families see school as a place that they want to be,” Chang said. We have to ensure families know, see and feel that school is physically healthy and safe, they feel a sense of belonging and their children are engaged academically.

Angella Graves, MAT, of Cornelius Elementary School in Oregon shared that she focuses on attendance in her communications with parents as a principal throughout the year. Her summer message to families includes vacation dates and lets families know how absences impact students academic progress. In September, she sends a letter to families who struggled with attendance the year before. For families with complex structures, Graves noted the team addresses each individually to find what works for that family. Sometimes it involves going through a student’s emergency contact list to ensure all adults are receiving school communications. It’s not a one size fits all, she said.

Jo Ellen Latham of South East Polk Community Schools in Iowa noted that, as a district, the key was helping schools move from punitive to positive and use data effectively. She offered the example of one of their schools, Delaware Elementary. The school has an attendance awareness campaign with posters and parent communications, including flyers and refrigerator magnets with the academic calendar. When students are struggling with attendance, the school sends families a formal attendance letter with attendance data, offers a home visit by the attendance team and, when needed, requests a family meeting with the principal to learn about the challenges to being in school and discuss solutions.

Francisco Baires of Capitol Region Education Council in Connecticut described the Connecticut State Department of Education Learner Engagement and Attendance Program (LEAP), a Tier 2 research-based, relational home visit model proven to increase student attendance and family engagement. Baires emphasized that the home visiting model is not a silver bullet solution. Rather it is a long-term relationship-building effort that includes initial and follow-up phone calls designed to establish a relationship. Families are not problems to be solved but rather co-partners in supporting their child’s attendance in school every day, he said.

Kari Sullivan Custer of the Connecticut State Department of Education shared the measurable impacts LEAP is having on student attendance. Research by the center for Connecticut Education Research Collaboration reports that one month after the initial home visit there was a 4 percentage point increase in attendance. Six months after the initial home visit, there was a 10 percentage point increase for pre-K–5, and for grades 6–12, there was a 20 percentage point increase. These results did not differ based on the title of the person conducting the home visit, Custer said. Equally important, since SY 2021–22, Connecticut has started to see statewide reductions in chronic absence. She attributes the reductions to three key factors: Connecticut’s long-standing commitment to family engagement and improved student attendance; integrated work across departments; and the use of data to inform investments and actions.

Kali Thorne Ladd of Children’s Institute (CI) in Oregon explained that CI is a community-based organization offering services across Oregon. To support schools working to improve family engagement, CI brings partners together across districts to talk and learn from one another, because many districts in the state are struggling with the same things. She stressed the value of including culturally specific outside partners to help schools connect with families and offer resources to those in need.

Nancy Duchesneau of The Education Trust shared results of a family engagement study involving two nationally representative surveys of parents and teachers, interviews with family engagement coordinators, and an online discussion board of 30 parents who had a child in first or second grade. Many of the findings overall were positive, but a deep dive showed that families reported experiencing a lot of barriers to engagement, such as scheduling conflicts, lack of transportation and child care. She praised the efforts the other panelists shared around using multiple avenues to reach parents, from phone calls and letters to empathy interviews and home visits, to building awareness with social media. “This diversification of approaches is really what parents need given their busy lives,” Duchesneau said.

The panel agreed that the priority activity in their attendance and engagement work is communicating clearly with parents and caregivers to develop trusting, positive relationships that encourage families to bring their children to school each day.