Educational policymakers, leaders, and researchers are paying increasing attention to student attendance and chronic absenteeism, especially in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Though researchers have documented the consequences and causes of absenteeism, there is limited empirical evidence about what schools and districts are actually doing to…

Teachers of color increase school success for students of color. Yet, little attention has been paid to whether school attendance behaviors also increase from same race and ethnicity matches. To address this, our study used administrative data provided by a California high school district for the school years 2014 to 2018. We explored student…

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to reverberate across the nation, for millions of students, educators, and families, the current school year is rife with challenges. The long-term impact of the disruptions of the last two years on student enrollment and attendance remains to be seen, particularly for students with whom schools have lost…

Student absenteeism is often conceptualized and quantified in a static, uniform manner, providing an incomplete understanding of this important phenomenon. Applying growth curve models to detailed class-attendance data, we document that secondary school students' unexcused absences grow steadily throughout a school year and over grades, while the…

This paper reports on a research and development project based upon problems in upper secondary school, namely students' lack of engagement, passive learning and students' absence from school. Looking to solve this problem, a group of upper secondary school teachers came across and saw potential in the concept, physical space and method of the…

The COVID-19 pandemic has seen an unprecedented shutdown of society. Among the various safety measures taken, much attention has been given to school closure as a non-pharmaceutical mitigation tool to curb the spread of the disease through ensuring "social" (physical) distancing. Nearly 1.725 billion children in over 95% of countries…

This study investigates the change in students' behavioural engagement as a result of participation in a Flexible Learning Program. Using an understanding of engagement as both a process and a relationship between the students and their school, we sought to determine whether students' attendance, participation, and conduct were different after the…

School learning starts with school attendance. Students need to be in school to receive instruction and learn from their teachers and peers. When schools have high rates of poor attendance, their academic achievement levels suffer. Ninth grade is a critical juncture that comes with increased student autonomy -- and new pitfalls, including the…

Background: While chronic absenteeism hurts all students, one particularly vulnerable group, students with disabilities (SWDs), has received little attention in research or policy. Particularly troubling is the dearth of research into the patterns of absences for SWDs and GENs who attend school together in urban school systems, given relatively…

Background: While chronic absenteeism hurts all students, one particularly vulnerable group, students with disabilities (SWDs), has received little attention in research or policy. Particularly troubling is the dearth of research into the patterns of absences for SWDs and GENs who attend school together in urban school systems, given relatively…

This report focuses on the COVID-19 pandemic in the Kalamazoo Public Schools District in Kalamazoo, Michigan, which closed its doors to students from mid-March 2020 to June 2021. During this time, instruction transitioned from face-to-face to virtual, with students having three options for virtual instruction. In addition to individual KPS student…

This First Look publication provides the first results of the 2019-20 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS:20), the most comprehensive national study of student financing of postsecondary education in the United States. This report includes information for about 80,800 undergraduate students and 19,700 graduate students attending 2,200…

This First Look report presents selected findings about student financial aid during the 2019-20 academic year. These findings are based on data from the 2019-20 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS:20). NPSAS:20 is a national study of undergraduate and graduate students enrolled any time between July 1, 2019, and June 30, 2020, in…

This First Look report presents selected findings about student financial aid during the 2019-20 academic year. This document contains supplemental tables which feature state-level percentages of students receiving aid and average amounts received by undergraduate students. These findings are based on data from the 2019-20 National Postsecondary…

This promising practice describes the summer programming transformation at a rural, Title I school. After eliminating barriers to education and remediation overtones, the school now provides free transportation, meals, and books for all participants and engages them in research-based, enrichment-focused literacy learning. The program's first year…