Staff Editorial: Fixing the attendance problems at OH

Recently, OH rates for chronic absenteeism have been the highest they have ever been in six years, reaching a staggering 37.8% according to the Illinois Report Card from the Illinois State Board of Education. This does not seem too unusual alone, but district and state percentages are at 22.9% and 28.3%, respectively.

After COVID ended and the transition back to school started, we saw a massive jump: 17.6% of students were chronically absent in 2021, then 35% of students were chronically absent in 2022. And in almost every measured statistic, we are higher than the state and district levels.

Principal Christopher Grays emailed students and guardians on Nov. 3, 2023, explaining why attendance matters in a linked letter.

Part of Grays’ letter stated that “many essential life skills, such as time management, responsibility, and accountability, are developed through regular school attendance. These skills are valuable not only for academic success but also for future career prospects.”

To tackle the issue of chronic absenteeism, OH has hired truancy interventionist Sherly Augustin to help. They even created a team of deans, counselors, administrators, and more to work on the underlying problems that caused the massive spike in absenteeism.

The school has tried several methods to solve the underlying issues behind chronic absenteeism, but at the end of the day, this problem is mostly student-based, and only so much can be done.

But still, as a community, we must try and help boost attendance rates. We need to make schools a place where kids want to be.

Tackling these issues, however, is far easier said than done. Conflicts are not solved with passive commentary from bystanders, and they certainly do not get solved with low-effort solutions.

So, how can OH solve its chronic absenteeism? 

Online/Hybrid learning

At first, online learning seemed like a far-fetched idea until we considered our school’s chronic absenteeism rates during COVID: a concerningly smaller 17.6%. During online and hybrid learning, sick students could come to school and not miss a single thing. Students forced to babysit, work, or other circumstances could also attend school and stay in the loop of their assignments.

Even Waubonsee Community College offers online and flexible learning to best cater to students’ needs. So it seems that online classes, a once-hated nightmare for all forced to go through them, could be the best solution.

But it’s not. The lower chronic absenteeism rate isn’t truly accurate due to the unpredictability of who’s there and listening during online classes. It’s easy to lie and say there are internet problems, especially when your camera and microphone are off.

In reality, online school doesn’t provide students with the same learning experiences and opportunities in-person school offers.

Online school is also a nightmare for teachers, who have to set up extra work, maybe even double, for the possibility of one or more kids who could all have varying reasons for their absence. If attendance is incorrectly marked, it could make emergencies with hybrid learning that much scarier.

The experience of remote learning would be rough with the size of OH, and hybrid learning would not suit the school’s needs.

Incentivize attendance

At first, incentivizing attendance seems like a good idea, but, after a bit of thought, some holes appear. 

One of the ideas could be having an open campus for lunch for students with good enough attendance. This would be an effective incentive for juniors and seniors who go to school regularly and have a car, but that is about it.

Freshmen and sophomores without access to cars wouldn’t be able to get the same benefits of an open campus lunch, and they have quite a bit of chronic absenteeism, with 24.8% and 32.4%, respectively.

For incentivized attendance to work, all grades have to benefit equally, and it has to be a good enough reward to bring kids who are chronically absent back to school. There are possible rewards for making this work, but none are an easy answer. There will always be kids who just do not care and will not come to school, as rewards in school will only help in school.

The verdict:

Chronic absenteeism is a difficult problem to solve. It requires a solution that applies to all students, regardless of grade, and makes them want to come back to school. 

Again, the problem may be difficult, but not impossible. We need to work together as a community and take more steps to make school a better environment. School needs to become a place where people want to spend time and not just view it as a waste. 

All in all, OH administrators are doing their best with the deck they have been handed so far. We can only hope that trial and error make chronic absenteeism less of a problem in school.