Kids Are Missing School at an Alarming Rate

from The New York Times I'm Katherine. benold this is the. [Music]. daily today long after schools have. fully reopened my colleague Sarah MOS. describes a more permanent shift in the. way kids and their parents think about. being in class after the pandemic which. is that school feels optional and kids. are still missing a lot of it.

[Music]. [Applause]. it's Tuesday April. [Music]. 2nd Sarah you're an education reporter. and you've been looking at what's. happened in schools since the pandemic. when kids missed many hours of class and.

fell way behind on their learning. targets it's been 3 years since most. kids went back to school so one might. expect things to be almost back to. normal but you found something. surprising tell us about that yeah. things are really not back to normal. even though it has been quite a while. since most or all kids have come back to. the classroom so for example we know. that kids are still academically behind. since the pandemic on average US. students have made up about a third of. their pandemic learning losses in math.

and about a quarter of their losses in. Reading H so overall academically. students are not back to where they. would have been without the pandemic got. it and then we're also just seeing still. a lot of Behavioral challenges in the. classroom kids having a lot of trouble. regulating their emotions and their. ability to sit in the classroom and. respond in an orderly way and be in a. really structured environment and so as. an education reporter I had been. following all of these Trends and. wondering like why isn't it back to.

normal and how did you answer that. question why aren't kids back to normal. so I came across this data and this. report that really crystallized things. for me and it was about absenteeism the. share of students who are missing a lot. of days of school before the pandemic. about 15% of us students were. chronically absent from school after the. pandemic 28% of students were. chronically from school so that's almost.

double wow and last school year the last. school year for which these National. estimates are available it was 26% so it. had barely improved and still one in. four students were chronically absent. from school and sah what does. chronically absent actually mean so the. way that it's typically defined is being. absent for at least 10% of the school. year and that typically works out to. about 18 days out of the Year m and so.

the reason why all of this matters is. because students not being in school and. not being in school regularly relates. directly back to the things I mentioned. at the beginning about academic catch-up. from the pandemic and academic. performance as well as like their. ability to regulate their behavior get. into a routine deal with some of the. mental health aspects of the pandemic. and so this issue is a window into. what's going on in schools today and one. of the most surprising things we saw and.

the data is that this is really. happening across demographic groups wow. so in poor communities which had higher. absenteeism rates before the pandemic it. has increased from about 19% before the. pandemic to around. 32% last school year but in rich. communities it's also increased from. about 10% to 19% and this is also. happening sort of similarly across. demographics in terms of how long school. districts stayed remote during the.

pandemic which was a surprise to me so. you see generally similar increases in. chronic absenteeism on average in. districts that were remote the longest. and districts that were opening. relatively quickly during the pandemic. wow that is striking and if it's. happening across demographic groups is. it equally happening across age groups. or uh there differences that you're. seeing so the way that one source. described it to me is that chronic. absenteeism is is like a Nike Swoosh.

explain that what do you mean a Nike. Swoosh yes so in the early grades you. see higher rates of absenteeism like in. kindergarten and first grade and then. you see this sort of like long tail at. the end in in Upper grades in high. school where absenteeism has also. historically been high so you have the. least absenteeism in the middle in like. elementary and middle school and then. High rates on either end so let's dig. into that a little more do we know why.

some students still aren't going back to. school what's causing this. absenteeism there's no one factor that's. driving the absences it's more like. there are a number of factors that pile. up on top of one another but probably. the most universally shared reason that. you'll hear is just illness schools have. always been germ factories but with Co. there is ostensibly you know one other. virus in the mix as well as just a. feeling of a changed culture around.

going to school and and to work sick and. I think some hesitance and caution from. families about sending their child to. school sick I can totally relate to that. having three kids of my own there is. certainly this kind of. self-consciousness that if somebody. cuffs or sniffles you feel the sense of. responsibility of not exposing the world. to your germs yeah and I think some. would argue that's been like a positive. cultural change for everyone's Health. since the pandemic but it's also. something that schools are now trying to.

fight against in terms of having some. new messaging to remind people that. school is obligatory it is mandatory and. they're sort of trying to re encourage. families to send their kids to school. unless you know they're actively. throwing up or they have an active fever. so it's a sort of a new recalculation. and recalibration so okay sickness is. one of the things that is keeping kids. home more what else is going on I think. mental health and anxiety is another big.

issue something that I heard in a lot of. interviews with parents and counselors. so we know that students and children. experienced increases in depression and. anxiety during the pandemic lots of. disruption to their school and home. lives and what I'm hearing from parents. as well as counselors is just a lot of. increases in anxiety and the way that. students relate to school because they. were removed from school and were able. to have distance and a barrier during.

critical periods of development and. re-engaging with that has been pretty. hard on a lot of kids hello hey Dana. again there's this one parent I spoke. with in Atlanta her name is Dana shepsky. she's a mom of two teenagers and she. went through this with her son who's now. 13 so my son he's very bright before the. pandemic she described him as like. really social extremely social very. well-liked extremely athletic and and.

gifted in that way love to do Sports. there were no sort of major Flags or. issues regarding his attendance and then. like everyone else in the spring of 2020. he was sent home he learns online by. fall of that year he gets back to school. relatively quickly but things were not. normal they had to wear masks and at. some point things start to take a. turn so he started to withdraw a bit.

from social activities the fear of. removing his mask in front of the other. kids overtook his ability to go to. football out of fear and anxiety and. that's when we realized that something. was very wrong eventually he is set to. start middle school he said I'll be fine. when school starts in the fall I just. need the summer to kind of do a reset. and.

he's sort of telling himself he's going. to go and it's going to go okay and he. said he was fine and he was ready and. then the first day of school came and he. was not fine he he doesn't go he refused. to go to school the first few days and. he kept telling himself that he'll do it. tomorrow and I think he was really. convinced of that and each time tomorrow. would come and he would get up and get. ready he would get in the car and we. would get to the parking lot of the. school and he just couldn't do it it. took a few days into the school year.

until he would actually go to school and. when he did it went okay He Saw all his. friends from fifth grade they were all. happy to see him he felt great he came. home and was just so relieved that that. chapter was over as were we. unfortunately that was only the. beginning of um further challenges but. then it started to get worse he started. to miss school probably a day or two a. week he felt like he wasn't really ready.

for the increased demands and pressures. of Middle School both socially and. academically and his response to that. was to just avoid it at any cost. possible and by later that fall we went. from missing school one or two days a. week the first month to by October of. that school year he was refusing. entirely he had pretty much stopped.

going. [Music]. altogether so it almost seems like. Dana's son is stuck in this kind of. vicious cycle where fear and anxiety be. get more fear and anxiety yeah and a. crucial thing is that her and her. husband were able to work from home. which is one aspect of this that some. parents do have the ability to work. remotely now which she would say like is. a factor in allowing some of this to.

happen and you know completely refusing. school is is perhaps an extreme example. but it is representative of some of the. the push and pull that kids are. experiencing right now where feeling. anxious can make you want to avoid. school but then the more you don't go to. school and you're out of your routines. it can make you feel more anxious about. going so it can be a vicious cycle and. for Dana and her family and her son it. took real professional intervention to.

help him get out of it okay so anxiety. about school and different feelings. about sickness are a couple of drivers. of this absenteeism that we're seeing. what else yeah there are a number of. other reasons and for this it can depend. on family situation so I think it's. helpful to break it out into two. different categories higher income. families and lower income families for. higher income communities and higher. income families um here a lot more that.

families are you know like going on. vacation they're not like so beholden to. like the spring break calendar it's sort. of like no problem let's add on a few. days at the end maybe we'll go off Peak. Travel season I heard from a number of. people that just aren't blinking about. that anymore like you you learn online. during Co you know we can just sort of. make it up um online we'll just sort of. figure it out like there's not that. sense of obligatory attendance as there. might have been before so basically the.

pandemic sort of normalized this idea. that that kids don't always need to show. up and maybe some parents are even. taking advantage of that yeah I mean I. think it's playing out in different ways. depending on your family circumstance so. if you're a higher income family maybe. you're taking advantage of a deal to go. to Hawaii for two weeks and it's not. like the peak Peak Travel season but if. you're a lower income family you have. different reasons it's sort of the same. underlying philosophy but they're. different motivating factors so some of. the the many reasons that lower income.

communities had higher rates of student. absences before the pandemic still exist. your student may have a job and that job. and the money that it brings in for your. family is more valuable than like the. daily attendance as well as needing. child care and babysitters for for. younger siblings maybe you were up all. night with a family situation and you're. tired and you over sleep you're not. going to school that day Transportation. barriers there's like any number of. reasons but it's also just this feeling.

that it doesn't feel mandatory anymore. that any of one of those barriers is. just a little more likely to keep you. home than before it's quite a contrast. isn't it it's almost like a perfect. satirical snapshot of our very unequal. Society right I mean so disadvantage. kids missing school because they're. working and more privileged kids missing. school because of vacation yeah and. actually really speaks to like some of. the other things about absenteeism where. if you're a higher income student you're. less likely to be academic Ally affected.

because you're off getting like an. enriching experience when you're out of. school whereas lower income students. it's more harmful for them to miss. school because the things that they're. missing for are not necessarily academic. Replacements so it sounds like there. were a few things that were set in. motion by the pandemic that exacerbated. problems that were already there and. then because of the way the world. settled into this new reality and. developed new habits and attitudes to. its sickness and remote work you have. this Kind of Perfect Storm that results.

in kids chronically missing more school. yeah and I think on an individual level. for any particular student or family it. might not seem so significant for the. one day that you're sick or the one day. you go on vacation but it does start to. add. up and then when you look at a school. level or a system level and the large. number of students and families this is. impacting that's where you start to see. that this is having a huge impact on. educ.

[Music]. we'll be right. [Music]. back so Sarah what is the implication of. so many kids missing school yeah so one. reason I think this is a helpful metric. is because absenteeism helps explain why. so many students across the country have. not caught up from their pandemic. learning losses so it's sort of both a.

cause and a symptom if you're behind. academically you don't really want to go. to school if you don't go to school you. fall further behind academically and. then with mental health if you have a. lot of anxiety you may not want to go to. school but then not going can fuel your. anxiety even more so it's all like. really interrelated and looking at this. gives us a clear picture of the. challenges facing schools right now and. part of why this is so relevant is. because absenteeism has impacts beyond.

the students who are absent themselves. so not only is it bad for their. academics there's research that shows. that when classmates are absent it can. negatively harm the academics of even. the students who do show up because the. teacher has to sort of adjust their. curriculum and slow down a bit to make. sure that everyone's on the same page. and then there's other research that. shows that absenteeism is culturally. contagious. on a given day if at least 10% of your.

classmates are absent you are then more. likely to be absent the following day so. we've talked a lot about the negative. impacts of missing school and this kind. of Doom Loop if you will and school in. many ways is about more than just the. academics right so what are kids missing. out on apart from this crucial time of. learning yeah I mean school is like. where you get prepared for social life. and and work life and society and so.

beyond the academics like there's a lot. that goes into school for very young. students who were very young during the. pandemic there's the element of learning. to stand in line for the bathroom. learning how to hold a pencil learning. to share like these are all things that. kids are learning in school and for. older students there's like learning to. engage with the world in a way that. you're going to have to do as an adult. in the workforce so one thing that. really stuck out to me is I talked to a. school counselor who told me like the. kids at her High School got so used to.

just Googling Solutions during the. pandemic that they have a lot of anxiety. around taking a test they don't know the. answers to or having a difficult. conversation with the teacher and so. those social skills those practicing of. awkward encounters or just like. acknowledging when you don't know. something and having to have a. conversation with someone else that you. then use in the workforce and your adult. life like school is where we practice. all of these things so so when experts.

project out into the long-term effects. of all of this what are they worried. about I mean as a nation we're concerned. with whether students are catching up. from the pandemic we saw historic losses. during the pandemic particularly in math. and the federal government has poured. billions of dollars into helping schools. catch up but if students are not there. they cannot benefit from interventions. in order to catch up and so that has. impacts on our economic future as a. country as well as for the students.

themselves in the system like when. you're in those early grades. establishing those daily habits of. attendance is crucial for your success. later on and in older grades you're. running out of time and so being. chronically absent to a serious degree. can be a predictor of Dropout or. disengagement from high school so all. age groups basically suffer and the. stakes are high I guess the next. question is how do we fix this are there. any solutions that you know of that are. actually working. yeah so there's lots of research out.

there that you have to sort of tackle. absenteeism from multiple angles some of. the things we've seen that have worked. there are campaigns to text message with. parents or send postcards to their home. letting them know like how many absences. actually have been accumulated so far. that school year that has seen some. positive effects there's been some. research that tutoring can have a a. positive effect on absenteeism perhaps. because it helps people engage.

academically and sort of interrupts that. cycle we were talking about and then. there's home visiting which has seen. some really promising results where. school districts are sending. Representatives out to connect with. families in their homes and find out. like why are you not going to school. what can we do to help. you hi it's Sarah at the New York Times. how are I actually spoke to a mom in. Michigan who received one of these. visits so tell me about you what is your. name where do do you live tell me a. little bit about your family her name's.

Regina murf I is myself and I have four. children I have two that are grown and. moved out she has two School AG kids my. six-year-old and 12-year-old that are. with me and they're both boys and. they're attending Ipsy Community Schools. and during the pandemic she was working. at a nursing home so she had sort of a. lot of virus exposure and I I lost my. younger sister that kind of put me in a. in a. mindset um and she lost her sister to.

covid-19 and I feel like that that's. when things kind of fell apart in a. sense and she was just sort of. struggling with my six-year-old you know. um in the you know in the morning I try. to make sure I have everything together. because if you're missing a shoe or if. you're missing simple items it's like. you know it kind of a a domino effect I. would say parents know like sometimes. the mornings can be rough when you're. trying to get your kids to school and. then ends up missing the bus I I'll say.

like oh just forget we'll try again. tomorrow and it was just harder to get. her kids to school in the morning early. enough to make the bus and then this. like um the fear of sickness sitting my. kids out there will they get sick I. don't want anything to happen to them. it's a lot of fears it was a lot of. fears there and so her kids started to. miss a good amount of school and then. someone came to my house and they um you. know just told me that they will worried. about the attendance and how and.

eventually she got a visit and I how do. they make you feel to have someone come. out and ask you about that I mean a part. of you kind of is embarrassed but um it. was refreshing to know that I had those. options to be able to reach out to them. he did the way that she described it to. me like she was a little embarrassed but. she also felt a little bit less alone. she was going through a hard time in her. life and so this home visit helped. reestablish the relationship with school.

helped make her more aware of you know. how many absences her kids had. accumulated helped her maybe make more. of an effort on the mornings when it is. hard to get them to school because she. knows there's going to be other times. when they'll have to miss because they. really are sick so it's this kind of. direct intervention a personal. intervention that maybe has the hope of. rebuilding the connection the broken. connection often between parents kids. and schools that we've seen since pmic. yeah I mean I don't think it's the only.

way but it speaks to something that's. really critical you know schools have. always been sort of the center of. American life and the center of. neighborhoods they're supposed to be. places of community places of. relationships friendships and so. reestablishing that connection is really. important to helping students and. families feel like there's reason to go. to school and I think by all indications. things are slowly getting better but not. like we're not back to prepandemic. levels and and this school year is going.

to be critical when we see the data from. this school year what is it going to. show I mean in interviews I'm talking to. Educators who are telling me you know at. least in their school like it's. continuing to some degree this school. year so I think there's some evidence. that while things are getting better you. know very slowly by you know as time. goes on something has changed. fundamentally you know when you think. back to all of those different reasons. that families are. and why kids are missing school they're.

pretty diverse like there's a bunch of. different reasons but the sort of Core. theme that underlies them is this shift. and this mindset that school is now. optional and that mindset took root. during the pandemic and that was the. lived experience for many families. school like it was optional to attend. school in person when school shut down. that broke the daily norm and it severed. a lot of famili Family Trust in the. education system that is supposed to be.

a reliable place and then when schools. reopened like there were still options. there were sort of relaxed policies. around grading and attendance and so it. all sort of culminates in this like. cultural shift of school feeling. optional and I think that's something. that you see you know in society more. broadly if you look at remote work for. example the rate of remote work for. those who can work remotely has remained. about the same since late 2022 so that.

seems to be here to stay that's a. long-term cultural shift brought about. by the pandemic and so this question is. like is that going to happen with. schools we saw that the pandemic. exacerbated and revealed all of the like. Beauties and flaws of our education. system students lost a lot of ground not. being in person so you can see on the. one hand what the value that schools. bring but then on the other hand it. revealed sort of all of the the flaws of.

our imperfect public education system. and the flaws of of a system that's. pretty strained in terms of its. resources and its ability to serve all. students and then their increasing needs. they have more academic needs they have. more mental health and behavioral needs. and so you're sort of seeing that all. culminate in this. moment so in some ways the pandemic. crippled our school system and by doing. so it actually showed the essential role.

schools play in society yeah and I think. also the essential role that. relationships and connection to one. another play in society and you know. today years out from the pandemic I hear. from teachers who are so exhausted and. feel so. underappreciated they're facing so many. challenges in their classroom I hear. from parents who feel failed in some. ways by the school system and like their. their kids are not getting what they. they need and so we're at this moment.

where we're sort of at a. Crossroads will schools stay optional or. will we come together again can this. trust be rebuilt will schools be the. pillars in our community going. [Music]. forward Sarah thank you thank. you.

[Music]. we'll be right. back here's what else you need to know. today Donald Trump has posted a $175. million bond that will prevent. authorities in New York from seizing his.

assets including his best known. properties while he appeals a civil. court judgment against. him Trump owes New York more than $450. million after a judge found he and his. sons knowingly inflated the value of. their properties he was originally asked. to pay a bond in that amount an amount. he was having trouble securing and only. got the bond once it was later lowered. to $175. million if Trump loses his his appeal he. will still owe the full $450.

million and Israeli air strikes. destroyed part of the Iranian Embassy. complex in Syria killing at least seven. Iranian officers overseeing cowt. operations in the Middle East three. Generals in the external military and. intelligence service of Iran's. revolutionary guards and four other. officers died in the attack making it. one of the deadliest in a yearslong. shadow war between Israel and Iran.

today's episode was produced by Clare. tennis gutter Luke Vander pluk summer. tomat and Diana win it was edited by MJ. Davis Lynn and Paige cowt contains. original music by Marian Lozano and Dan. Powell and was engineered by Chris Wood. our theme music is by Jim brenberg and. Ben lansor of. [Music]. Wy. that's it for the daily I'm Katherine.

benold see you. [Music]. tomorrow.