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In the four years since the pandemic closed schools.

U.S. education has struggled to recover on several fronts, from learning loss to enrollment to student behavior.

However, perhaps no issue has been as stubborn and pervasive as the sharp increase in student absenteeism, a problem that cuts across the demographics and is continued long after schools reopened.

According to the most recent data from 40 states in Washington, D.C., an estimated 26% of public school students were chronically absent last year, up from 15% before the pandemic.

Chronic absences, typically defined as missing at least 10% of the school year, or about 18 days for any reason.

So what's the situation with absenteeism in Toledo?

Is it a problem?

And if so, how is it affecting the education of our kids?

What measures are being taken to address it and are we making progress?

Heather Baker, director of Community Engagement and student support from Toledo Public Schools, and Ryan Eldridge, associate principal at Monac Elementary School in Washington local, are joining me to discuss this issue.

I'm Doni Miller, and welcome to the point.

Hey you guys know that you can connect with us on our social media pages.

You can also email me at Doni underscore Miller at wgte dot org.

And for this episode and other additions, don't hesitate to go to wgte.org to the point.

Before we get started there, I want to say thank you to this wonderful woman that I met in, the Kenwood post office last week.

You made my day.

Some days you just need a little kindness from strangers.

And you did that for me.

And thank you.

Thank you so much.

You know who you are.

Thank you.

now, having said that, I have another wonderful thing to talk about today with wonderful folks.

We're going to talk about how you can help with the issue of absenteeism in our schools.

It's not talked about enough.

it's but it is really an issue.

Is that right Heather?

Heather: Absolutely.

It's an issue.

Doni: Okay.

How are you seeing this?

Ryan: Yeah.

So, as you mentioned, across the nation, it has been an issue since the pandemic.

And one of the biggest factors to it is when we're not there, it's hard to learn.

And so, we're seeing it percentages have have spiked.

Now, the good thing is we do see, continuous pattern of decline.

And I know that's, huge, attribute to a lot of times, staff building those, rebuilding those positive relationships after the pandemic.

and some of those factors.

And then we have a lot of initiatives, and, and pieces that we're trying to work on to make sure we're getting our kids back in there and people to understand the the impact that it has when you're not.

Doni: Why did the pandemic have an impact on learning and absenteeism?

I've never been able to quite wrap my head around that.

Heather: I believe when it was time to return back to school.

You know, we've been shut down after being shut down for so much time.

Habits, right?

You develop these habits of, I'm wanting to be home.

I'm wanting to be where I feel safe and secure, and returning back to school and returning back to the habit of going outside of the home for some just didn't feel safe.

Right?

Many parents didn't even want to send their students back to a classroom where there would be 20 other students, in fear of what made would return home with the student some type of virus.

and, and really just really trying to get back into the habit and of returning to school, coming back to school.

Getting back into that daily routine.

It really was a lot, I think, not just for the students, but for the adults.

Doni: for the adults as well.

It resulted in learning loss.

Heather: Absolutely.

Definitely.

we had a lot of catching up to do.

a lot of tutoring a lot of extra initiatives to build wraparound services around the families, because also post-Covid, you know, we have trauma, and trauma often manifests itself in many ways in the classroom.

It can be behavior issues, disengagement.

and we've seen a lot of that, again, not just in our students, but in our adults and parents and teachers.

All of us experienced this, this Covid together.

So we all had to work on our reset.

Doni: One of the things that I read in my research for this show was that you all are seeing, not not just you all, but across the nation.

Ryan, you all are seeing higher rates of mental health issues with kids post-Covid, which results in absenteeism.

Ryan: Yeah.

So, it has been where I think there's, there's it's a it's a double edged sword here.

I mean, essentially one thing that happened during Covid was we finally brought awareness to mental health issues.

And I think that was a big thing is, really being able to look at and look at that impact and see how that is.

But, there, you know, there was an underlying, especially with males, an underlying factor of you just bare down grit and keep going.

And that has kind of it's change in society.

And it's for a good for a good thing because, you know, you think about stresses and anxiety and those factors and how they affect and jumping back into how that affects in attendance there.

there's a there's a lot of that.

But yeah, as far as the mental health aspect, I think that plus kind of what Heather was touching on with the big change from Covid and that being, you know, kids, kids possibly sometimes it goes from structure to structure, sometimes it goes from, sometimes it goes from being going to school and being able to learn there to being in charge.

because mom or dad has to work.

and so they're looking over their, their, their young ones, and their siblings in that.

So that's, that's always been I think that it brought more heightened attention.

And so than those stresses and anxiety, those types of factors that people look at.

And we're really focusing in on.

and just if I can kind of just segway from that, I know with stresses and anxiety, when you're not there, you feel back, you feel like you're always catching up.

And I think that's that's one of the biggest things we're seeing now is kids.

well, we think about it when we were at work.

And if you go on vacation and there's somebody picking up that stuff that the your workload and you come back, you feel refreshed, but if you come back after vacation and you've got to catch up and do all that, and now you're stressed again and you're playing catch up, and you think about it when you're in your work and and really the factor there is we go into that and we feel stressed.

So we right away associate that with school.

We don't want to go to school.

And it's a pattern where we continue to not want to go to school because we're stressed, because we are, behind.

And then that causes us to get further behind.

And so it's kind of a turn.

And that's what, you know, our fear is with attendance and really just trying to help in that learning and teaching our skills.

So as our kids grow, they understand those skills and those habits to work hard and, and when they become employed, it helps in that.

And because you see it changing in the employment and too.

Doni: Yeah.

If I didn't mention Ryan is or if you've forgotten, Ryan is from Washington local and Heather is from TPS and you you all are saying you both are agreeing on all the major points here.

So it's not an issue of school district.

Heather: No, absolutely not an issue.

A school district.

And I do have to agree with Ryan on the point of the mental health piece.

I'm really, really proud of Toledo Public Schools, and before Covid, we had already instilled mental health partners in each of our buildings.

So we were ahead of the game there.

but post Covid, I'm so glad each of our buildings have that extra added resource because we do see the trauma that you mentioned.

We do see the anxiety and it is still here even all these years later post Covid.

So we know that we're still working through that and having added resources to deal with that is a huge help for us and the district.

Doni: it's this is all such interesting and surprising conversation in so many ways.

One of those ways is that I think many of us thought that online learning was a good substitution.

I hear you saying that there's some real benefit to being in the classroom.

Ryan: So yeah, I mean, essentially we always look at in the education lens, is there all different types of learners?

Some people are auditory and just hearing it and being able to some people are visual and some people are kinesthetic or needing to tactile, needing to put hands on, you know, we think about it and industry and all those types of factors.

And so for some kids, it absolutely helped them flourish.

And that was one of the great things.

And I always try to look at both the bad but also the good.

And that showed us, you know, utilizing technology and utilizing those pieces to provide, visual visuals and some of those things through.

That means that kids may have had an interest in, because we see the technology is, second nature to some of our kids nowadays because they're in their hands so early.

Yeah.

so, yeah, I mean, essentially it's really that factor of what type of learner you are.

And so it can be good, but also then a lot of a lot of kids that struggle because you really it was very, very difficult to get that kinesthetic or tactile piece in an online environment.

Doni: And the other thing too, that we haven't mentioned is the importance of, developing relationships when you're not in school, right?

You're not developing those relationships, Heather: socialization is does hurt.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We, I love that you mentioned the different type of learners because that's so important, for your audience to know you, you have students who do extremely well, just like Ryan said, outside of school, behind a computer screen.

That's wonderful for them.

But to all be forced to do that, to learn in that way, when some students absolutely need to be in a building to see their friends, to socialize with their friends, to talk to their teachers, and to build those relationships for them, that's everything.

Right?

So it depends on what type of learner you are.

And a lot of our students that were forced to have to learn behind that computer screen for that school year really did lose a lot because of the socialization and loss of socialization, the loss of those friendships and those connections.

some students really, truly needed that, right?

Doni: You know, the the, Ryan, your comment earlier about some kids having to stay home to take care of kids, I was very surprised to see that.

And the data shows that that's happening more and more.

The other thing that the data is showing is that parents, typically in more affluent families, are taking kids out of school for vacations.

tell me that's not true.

Ryan: And unfortunately, unfortunately, it is.

I mean, and what I'll say is, you know, you mentioned chronic absenteeism in the beginning.

And so if that student happens to miss those five days and doesn't miss any more, there's that catch up time.

It's going to be stressful coming back.

But they can catch up.

But as we add that vacation time and then sickness and then staying home for X, Y or Z, those add up and then it continues that pattern of being behind.

And that's where we see huge extents of learning loss.

Heather: Absolutely.

And I think it's important to stress there's some things nobody can be a straight A student.

But there's some things when you miss school that you can't make up.

Yeah, right.

You can't make up the science experiment.

You can't make up the guest speaker that comes in to talk about, business relationships and being an entrepreneur.

They're just some things that once you miss it, there's no way to get it's gone away.

Absolutely.

And so we want to stress to our parents that every minute counts if they are not ill, if they don't have a fever, we really need them to be in school, in attendance, on time, every day.

Doni: I want to talk about that a little more when we come back, every minute counts.

When it comes to your child's education.

We're going to go away for just a minute.

But don't you go away.

We'll be right back.

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Doni: Thank you for staying with us.

As you know, you can always join us on our social media pages.

I tell you guys this all the time.

You can email me at Donny underscore Miller at dot org, and you can find any of our episodes, this one and any others at dot org to the point if you missed us, the first segment, I'm really sorry about that.

Great information from these two experts.

in the area of student, the importance of of attending school, with us today are Heather Baker.

She's the director of community engagement and student support at TPS, and Ryan Eldridge, who's the associate principal at Monarch Elementary in Washington.

Local.

Thank you guys again so much for being with us today.

And we were talking about not that we want to make parents feel bad about going on vacation.

That's not the point.

and we talked about that just a bit in our other segment.

But we do want you to know that every single minute in school is important.

Heather, I think we left with you saying that every single minute is important.

Heather: Absolutely.

Every single minute.

There's going to be something amazing happening for your student every single minute when they're at school, whether it's the socialization, whether it's the science experiment, the guest speaker, it could be a myriad of wonderful things, but they really need to be in school to experience it.

If you're not in school, you're going to miss it.

we understand illness happens.

we've all experienced some type of cold or fever or something you need to be home for, but if it's not something you need to be home for, being in attendance, it means everything.

And it's that chronic absenteeism that it counts.

Even those excused days, even if it is an illness, is still counts in that chronic absenteeism rate.

So we really want to make sure our students are engaged every day showing up on time.

Doni: You know, as with many things that happen in the society, they fall back into your laps to address the school system is addressing all kinds of issues, these days, hunger and homelessness.

And I know that that's one of the issues that you pay great attention to.

And TPS, because the number of homeless students that you have in your system, this is another one of those things that you all have to address.

What are those programs that you are managing that are close to your heart, that you're seeing work?

Ryan: Yeah.

So so some of the things that are I mean, the jump out to us when we think of absence is health.

And so one of the factors there that our student support services have done a great job with and diving into that nutrition and our, our, our Office of Nutrition is that we have we still have free breakfast for every single student.

It doesn't matter who.

And the great thing about that is they get a hot option and a cold option.

so that is one that I think is just amazing.

coming into Washington local recently here myself.

And then in addition to that, the high school has a, a health center.

And so they provide vaccinations, but also mental health services that we talked about earlier, as well as, just simple wellness checks and all those types of factors.

And then in addition to that, we're bringing on in the coming years here, telehealth, so that you can phone a doctor and get medicine and they can still issues, some of the basic meds there for any of those sicknesses, because when you think about it, some people do not have access to, easy access to a doctor and some of those types of factors.

and then in addition, so I've talked a lot about our support services, we also are doing a lot of things to, raise up our kids and build that positive relationship and continuing that, so different types of incentives that we have and we offer, it's really focusing on celebrating, doing the right thing or being there.

And so we know that absence happens.

Sometimes you think of when, when you think of, attendance, we think of perfect attendance.

And we're not thinking along perfect attendance.

We know things happen.

So getting monthly attendance incentives quarterly and kind of incentives that, excuse me, quarterly attendance incentives, all factor into that.

And then really trying to figure out what those incentives are and what motivates, you know, we think about what motivates people and really focusing in on what motivates students.

So those are some of the factors for for us.

And we're continuing to grow and learn and and steal from others, which is what Heather: is so funny.

I definitely agree with Ryan.

we do have the health centers and our comprehensive high schools that are open to the students in that learning community and families as well, because, as you said, many families do, have lack of access to health services, which we know you help with as well.

but I really do think, those additional incentives, we have a program called Get Connected truancy prevention, program.

And through that program, we have six attendance champions who are absolutely amazing.

We don't have truancy officers in our district.

We don't believe in that.

what we want to do is send people out to look for our students who are missing or who have missed a lot of school or truant, and they're knocking on the doors and they're asking, how can we help?

How can we help remove those barriers to attendance, whether it's transportation, school supplies, school clothes, and some of the issues can be something big.

Like, I have a $3,000 water bill, and I can't wash my clothes or we can't take a shower.

So if it's a resource, we can't get our hands on, we can connect them to a community resource to help really move that barrier out of the way and get their student back into school.

If it's homelessness, we've got, you know, resources for that, if it's lack of food, resources for that, because if I don't know where I'm going to sleep tonight, if I don't know what I'm going to eat, I'm not worried about school.

You know, that family's in crisis.

They can't focus on something like school if I'm worried about those bigger things.

So how can we wrap services around the whole family?

Not just the student, but the whole family, to remove those barriers to attendance out of the way?

because I think once the family is settled and the student can refocus on school and getting back engaged in school, and that's huge for us.

And it solves incentives too.

We absolutely.

I absolutely agree with that point, that it's not those perfect attendance students, because we're going to reward those.

Those students are going to get kudos because and we want to reward those students, but it's those ones that may have missed a few weeks.

And now, you know, we say, hey, what are you willing to work for to show back up to school?

And they may say something simple, and they start showing up and they start engaging.

You develop this relationship.

So just those feeding, those few incentives to to reengage them and then helping them to, you know, internalize, hey, I need to be here.

It's important for me to be here, but also us saying, we see you, we missed you.

We're so glad you're back.

And we want to reward that.

Doni: Wow, that is so cool.

So many people.

I guarantee you had no clue about what you just said.

No clue about what either of you have said.

Lack of access to resources, not being able to take a shower.

Right?

Not being able to wash your clothes, not not having a doctor that that you go to.

And and I know because we, this community is very well resourced in terms of social services mean if there is a need.

I have to say this community's done a great job in developing responses to the need and and one, connecting kids to meals that I know that you work with.

I if you're not working at the Washington local, are you working Ryan with them?

They're really good at making sure that they are augmenting, the food services that you all are providing because sometimes kids go to school just to eat right?

Just to eat, right.

Ryan: Yeah.

And I love that Heather mentioned that family connection, because I think that's something that sometimes you think of in schools.

And some people had a negative experience in school and that and some.

So reaching out and having a positive.

And how can we help, how can we support is an important piece of that.

And I think that's one thing that the attendance piece has really grown.

and, you know, looking at some of the things we do is as we look at where students struggling with attendance, putting an improvement plan in place or an intervention plan and saying, what are the barriers and what are the supports and how can we help?

Let's solve this together.

And I think that's an important piece of this.

Doni: You know, one of the things I read too was that there, there's an increase in teacher absence since Covid.

Are you guys seeing that?

Not so much.

Heather: Not so much on, on on our in.

but we are focusing really on not just the trauma informed care for our students, but trauma informed care for our teachers.

For your teachers.

Absolutely.

because we're adults, are just little people grown up.

Right?

Right.

And we all experienced Covid together.

We all experienced that trauma together.

So we really want to practice self-care.

And it's not.

Sometimes self-care is just one more thing on your already full plate.

Yes.

so we want to provide spaces and places and opportunities to, to get that self-care where it's not something that our teachers have to do, but something that we've provided for them.

So we built in little pieces, that and parts of that to help, because we know that that's an issue as well.

Doni: That's such a good point because, at the end of the day, this lands on the plate of every teacher who is trying to manage that classroom and teach our kids.

And, this isn't what they went to school to do, right?

You know, so it's it's it's it's difficult.

It's difficult.

What what can parents do?

Ryan: Yeah.

So, to start out, I want to jump back to that last part.

There's one of the things is that that's socially socialization piece that those kids miss.

So they're still there behind and learning some of those skills.

And that becomes some of the behavioral things.

So it becomes managing to try and get those in place.

And I think that's that's an important piece to us.

So yes.

And so it's starting to happen where it's catching back up there.

And we have the same situation where teachers and staff have been great.

one of the things that I do see is a deficit.

Maybe that's where it looks like teachers aren't necessarily coming as much as that.

We haven't had as many substitutes.

we've lost a little bit more in the substitute.

And and so that might be where there's more awareness because so-and-so's coming in and they're doing a great job and different staff coming in to help and support because as they always say, it takes a village to, to raise.

Yeah.

and so jumping out to what we can do.

so one of the biggest things is starting off with setting a routine.

I think setting a routine, a bedtime routine and a morning routine is very helpful to take some of that stress off and get into that habit that gives those structural pieces.

and then also we talked about breakfast a little bit and making sure whether it's at school or at home, kids are getting breakfast that, you know, metabolism jumps to jump start your metabolism helps you to learn and ready for the day.

in addition to that, it's communicating communication with on both ends where we're communicating as a school, but also the families communicating and telling us, hey, we're struggling with this and let's, let's help.

Doni: And it's okay for them to do.

People need to know that that's absolutely okay for them to do Heather: that communication piece is huge, is huge, and we know many of our families.

You may not be the person responsible for the send off.

Maybe you have to go to work a lot earlier and you're due depending on daycare or something for the send off.

and we're hope that their routines built around that.

But that communication piece, even if you're not the person doing the sending off and dropping them off right to the door, making sure they got to the door, checking your classroom dojo or whatever the app that teacher or classroom or our school may be using.

We have several different, applications in our district that we use for that, but making sure they got to school on time, checking those homework, checking those grades.

Many times when we sit down with parents and we'll show, an attendance report, they won't be aware at all that their student have been late so many times or have had so many absences.

but really checking in, communicating on the on your in as a parent to ensure that things are going as they should be.

Doni: This is such a huge, huge topic, and we can talk about this for so much more time than we have today.

So I'm going to ask you guys to come back, maybe closer toward the end of the year and the school year and maybe things will have changed a little bit.

We hope, we hope for the better, for the better, for the better.

Thank you both so much for joining us.

And thank you for joining us too.

And I will see you next time.

On to the point.

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