Showing Up Is Half the Battle: What We Can Do to Tackle the Attendance Crisis

Stephen Hawking (or Woody Allen, depending on your source) is credited with the saying, “Showing up is half the battle.” When it comes to school attendance, I’d venture to say that it is 90 percent of the battle because once kiddos are in the building, they mostly stay and do what they need to do to be successful. ThisUSA Today article from June 2024 chronicles the multifaceted issue of attendance. From a teacher’s perspective, it is difficult to help students catch up, particularly if there is a pattern of absences like missing Mondays. Why? Students struggle to get their equilibrium when they are always coming from behind, and students with mental health concerns begin a cycle of anxiety/absence/catching up/anxiety. As a parent, there is a fine line between pushing one’s child past their insecurities or low-level anxiety or shoving them into an all-out panic attack or mental health crisis. If this sounds like a heavy topic, it is. In my roles as educator and parent, I’d argue that we can work together to “tag team” the attendance problem. Here’s the approach I believe can help combat one of the biggest problems we are seeing in schools post-pandemic. 

Creating a Caring Environment

Families:              

Framing our concerns for our kiddos in terms of our care for them versus the imminent failure that chronic absenteeism causes can go a long way toward easing the pressure. Invest time in having face-to-face conversations with your child, but keep them low pressure over coffee or on a walk. Open lines of communication with our children allows families key information about what might be causing their child to avoid school. How we handle absenteeism is reliant on accurate information about our students’ hurdles. Some students face anxiety, others have academic issues, and others face bullying behaviors. Others simply don’t have pre-pandemic stamina. Each of these reasons requires a different approach by families, but if we don’t know the root cause, we’ll never be able to provide the support needed. 

Educators:                   

The most important thing educators and our schools can do is create an environment that makes students feel welcome. When they are late or absent, the first thing they need to hear from schools is “We are glad you are here” or “Welcome back.” It is not a lecture or disapproval. Schools have an obligation to “make” kiddos come to school, for sure, but we have already found out that the world has changed, and shaming students and families no longer tracks. While the stability of schools should be a “pull factor,” approaching students and families with disdain creates a “push factor” that precipitates alienation. 

Communication

Families:               

Some elementary teachers ask families to send a “Handle with Care” note if their child is struggling, a sort of passing of the baton with a nod to the importance of shared information. My co-teacher recently updated our Back-to-School slideshow. We have always let families know that we are there for our students, but the last slide now emphatically says, “Shoot us a quick email if your kiddo is having a rough day! We are here to help.” We want to be overt with the families that we see their children, and we care deeply about them as whole humans, complete with all the complications that come with that! We’ve already gotten a “head’s up” that a student had to put their dog down, and another let us know that a student’s friend had just received a cancer diagnosis. I know that as parents, we don’t always think that teachers want/need all this information, but I can attest that sending my own kiddo’s teachers a “Handle with Care” email has allowed me to rest easier, and thus assure my child that he’d be OK. Trusting my kids’ teachers has always been a great privilege of living and working in the same district.

Educators:          

None of this will work without the educators being open and willing to communicate with families. Additionally, we have to mean it—not just at an open house. Truth be told, I don’t send the “head’s up” email to all of my kiddos’ teachers because I often feel like we are being too needy when we want to share what is going on beyond the gradebook. However, there are some teachers who I know will take care of my kiddos, and I would reach out because they have proven that they are interested. Does this feel like you are crossing some boundary? As long as you are communicating in email, and you keep the information confidential, it is completely professional.               

This need for communication isn’t just reserved for teachers. Administrators need to be responsive to what they see and hear, especially in this age of social media saturation. The day doesn’t end anymore with the bell, and we all need to be the “eyes and ears” to keep everyone safe. There should be a way to access administrators that is very obvious to families and students alike. 

Flexibility

Families:      

Most people who read my blogs and books know that I preach flexibility to educators, but lately I’ve recognized that families must practice flexibility as well. Sometimes, no matter how amazing your kiddos’ teachers are, you’re going to hear something that you don’t love. You might think that an assignment is useless or that your child is not being given the same attention as someone else’s child. Families need to recognize that their children’s teachers are human, and there might be a very good reason that your child’s grade isn’t updated or that they accidentally put in a 10 instead of a 100. Communicate when you feel something can’t be left unsaid, but also make sure that you aren’t making a mountain out of a molehill. Teach your children how to advocate for themselves as much as possible, and when things aren’t going the way you’d like, give it a little time. Often, teachers will get back on track if they have a rough week—all without you telling them what they are doing wrong! 

Educators:         

Will these “hacks” help? On the micro-level—and in my experience as a parent and educator post-pandemic—yes, I do think so. However, this is a systemic and societal issue that can seem insurmountable. This white paper by Dr. Sandy Addis, chairman of the National Dropout Prevention Center, takes a deeper dive into the research, and I’d encourage everyone to take a longer look. Circling back though, another way to look at “showing up is half the battle,” is a call to action to take care of each other psychologically and emotionally. As families and educators, we need to acknowledge our shared responsibility to “show up” for these kiddos, as this Psychology Today article “The Vital Importance of Showing Up for Others and Ourselves” explains. Does your family or school have a good hack to help the attendance problem? I’d love to hear about it!