Decoding NAEP: Attendance Matters

Continuing CGLR’s winter series examining the data and results from NAEP, also known as the Nation’s Report Card, the latest session delved into an analysis of the recently released Education Recovery Scorecard report. While NAEP provides nationwide trends in reading and math, the Scorecard offers an opportunity to focus on the impacts of pandemic-related disruptions and subsequent recovery efforts, providing a deeper understanding of how remote learning, federal expenditures, and other factors influenced student learning during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Among these factors, chronic absenteeism has had the most significant effect and continues to persist, negatively affecting the progress and pace of learning recovery.

In this session, John Gomperts of CGLR had the opportunity to engage with a lead author of the Scorecard report, Tom Kane, Ph.D., of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, along with Hedy Chang of Attendance Works, a leading voice on chronic absenteeism and strategies to increase attendance. Kane and Chang reviewed the findings from the Scorecard and examined data on the ways in which absenteeism is persisting and impacting learning recovery—not only for the students who are absent but for all students in the classroom. Kane provided context by sharing related findings from the Scorecard:

“We provide evidence that shows the districts with higher absence rates had somewhat slower recovery, drawing the connection between chronic absenteeism and slow recovery. From the evidence in the report, [we have realized that we are not fully] understanding the effects of chronic absenteeism, and we’ll be studying this more in the future. We may find out that absenteeism is having an even more negative effect than we’re estimating right now.”

Chang shared additional data on attendance and absenteeism across states and districts, setting the stage for a discussion with state leaders who shared their strategies and the learning recovery progress they have seen as a result of their focus on increasing attendance. Those state leaders included Kari Sullivan Custer of the Connecticut State Department of Education, Lewis Ferebee, Ed.D., Chancellor of the District of Columbia School District, Lori Masseur of Read On Arizona, and Ernise Singleton, Ph.D., of the Louisiana Department of Education, each of whom described their work across their states and districts.

Home visits emerged as a primary strategy to increase attendance through partnerships with families. Custer described how this strategy took effect in Connecticut:

“One of the most effective strategies was our Learner Engagement Attendance Program, which was founded in spring 2021—we call it affectionately LEAP. Governor Lamont and the Connecticut State Department of Education launched LEAP, which is a statewide, positive and relational home visiting intervention to re-engage students and families. LEAP is not just about the home visit. It’s about equipping districts and home visitors with training, performance management tools, and high-touch support. And we use home visit logs to analyze the barriers to attendance and address challenges head-on.”

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