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Oregon leaders have known since at least 2013 that a huge proportion of students miss at least 10 percent of the school year, directly leading to poor reading and math achievement and horrific graduation rates. In the final month of 2016, state officials released a plan to try to address the problem.
(courtsey of chief education office)
Oregon education officials laid out their plans late Thursday for how to fight chronic absenteeism, a rampant problem in schools and a prime reason the state has one of the nation's worst graduation rates.
In a report required by the Legislature, the Oregon Department of Education and Gov. Kate Brown's Chief Education Office said they would deploy a team of on-the-ground experts to help the 30 percent of schools with sky-high absenteeism do better. They also call for more attention from the top.
But training and deploying those 20 coaches, along with other fixes laid out in the report, would first require the state to commit the resources to make it happen. That includes an estimated $3.5 million a year in funding, nearly half of which would go to hire the coaches.
Gov. Kate Brown, who'd been briefed on the request for that money, did not specifically recommend any in her proposed $20.6 billion state budget Thursday.
Chronic absenteeism is defined as missing at least 10 percent of the school year. At the 350 Oregon schools with absenteeism crises, at least one in five students misses that much. The Oregonian/OregonLive first chronicled the depth, causes and impacts of that problem in a February 2014 special report, Empty Desks.
Missing that much school in kindergarten and first grade can mean never learning to read well. Missing that much in high school is a sure statistical sign that a student is unlikely to earn enough credits to graduate.
Only a handful of states have as big a chronic absenteeism problem as Oregon's, and there is no evidence it's substantially improved since the problem was first reported on a school-by-school basis in fall 2013.
Framers of the plan say they expect at least 80 percent of Oregon schools to have fewer than 10 percent of their students be chronically absent. Currently, just one in five schools meet that test.
On the flip side, they say it's reasonable to expect Oregon would have only about 3 percent of its schools, or fewer than 40
,
with at least 20 percent of their students miss
ng so much school. Right now, 30 percent of all schools do.
Backed by new data tools and expertise from the two education agencies, the 20 attendance coaches would help those schools examine in detail what is going wrong not only at the school but also with families it serves. They then would make a customized plan to reverse those patterns.
Though Brown hasn't specifically recommended funding the coaches, she did recommend that her "education innovation officer," Colt Gill, be given a $20 million "graduation equity fund." A spokeswoman said Friday that Brown intends for Gill to devote some of it to fighting chronic absenteeism.
"Strategies for addressing attendance are essential to the governor's goal of improving graduation outcomes," spokeswoman Melissa Navas said.
The report also calls for the state to commit resources that don't cost money, including use of the bully pulpit.
Brown, Gill, state schools chief Salam Noor and Lindsey Capps, Brown's chief education officer, should all make the most of their influence in speeches, emails, newsletters and conversations with Oregonians to talk up the importance of students not missing school.
Capps agreed the work laid out in the plan is "urgent" but cautioned there are no "simple solutions" and that failure or success largely depends on personal relationships with students and families.
He specifically endorsed one element in the plan: Giving resources and support to regional panels that would seek customized approaches to the particulars of absenteeism in their parts of the state.
Robin Shobe, the Oregon Department of Education's chronic absenteeism specialist, said she is optimistic the coaches and the rest of the plan can make a big difference.
Other key steps the plan calls for:
-- Giving schools a user-friendly tool to see real-time data showing their absentee levels and patterns.
-- A state-led, statewide campaign promoting the value and importance of regular school attendance and how all partners in a community can contribute. The state should also provide customizable messaging to use at the local level.
-- Keeping in mind the role that children's health, including mental health, plays in keeping students home from school, the plan says schools and communities should address those needs.
-- Encouraging schools to approach absenteeism as a three-level problem. All students should get some help coming to school, including hearing regularly how important it is to be at school on time every day and finding welcoming adult faces and voices when the arrive.
Students who show signs of early attendance trouble, such as missing more than one day the first month of the school year, should get special attention, such as a personal call home to parents or a requirement to check in with a friendly adult each morning.
The students with the biggest problems should get intensive intervention, including deeper inquiries into the underlying issue and personalized help such as being taken under one teacher's wing, getting connected to mental health care or being put into a class or activity that's highly interesting and relevant.
-- Culturally sensitive practices, including at the school door and front office and inside classrooms. Racist, classist and other insensitive words and actions play a big part in why some children and families stay away from school.
"Things like equity, culturally responsive teaching, consideration for the whole child were some of the most important themes we want to come out of it," Shobe said, speaking for the large group that wrote the report.
Shobe said her hope that those steps and the 20 coaches can make a real difference rests on the work that Oregon educator Scott Perry has done to help schools examine their practices. Perry, she said, has also helped schools examine parents' and students' and teachers' perceptions to figure out what's going wrong and brainstorm solutions.
Perry started what he then called "school attendance audits" years ago when working at Southern Oregon Education Service District and has continued intermittently in other roles since then.
Schools and districts he worked with, including in Hillsboro and West Albany High, have become models at preventing chronic absenteeism and engaging students, leading to high graduation rates among other benefits.
Now a semi-retired consultant, Perry has fine-tuned his methods, including the questions he asks, the things he measures, the surveys he sends parents and teachers, and the in-depth interviews he does with students. He is willing to share his materials for free, and framers of Oregon's plan expect he would personally train the 20 coaches who would replicate his work, Shobe said.
Having well-trained extra hands out in schools to help examine systemic problems and recommend proven fixes is a key element of the strategy, she said.
"The state can do so much," she said. "But the really heavy lift happens in the schools."
NOTE: This post has been updated to reflect that the $7 million budget request covers the state's next two-year budget, not a single year. Thus, the request is for $3.5 million a year.
-- Betsy Hammond