Attendance and Student Success

STUDENT SUCCESS IS LINKED TO REGULAR SCHOOL ATTENDANCE

Student attendance and success in school are linked together. This is what studies have shown at all grade levels. 

• For elementary students, regular attendance supports students' reading skills 
  • In Fairbanks, students with 90% or greater attendance were shown to have higher proficiency rates in reading
     
• For middle school, regular attendance is linked to lower dropout rates
  • In Fairbanks, students who are chronically absent are over 4 times more likely to drop out
     
• For high school students, greater attendance is correlated with higher graduation rates
  • By 9^th grade, regular attendance is a better predictor of graduation rates than 8^th grade test scores

Sources: FNSBSD Data Dashboards, Attendance Works, Tackling Attendance Challenges (ASCD)

WHAT IS REGULAR ATTENDANCE?

Regular school attendance means students attend school in-person for 90% or more of the school year. 

Our district's goal for attendance is to increase the overall percentage of students attending school 90% or more. That means:

• Students miss fewer than 17 days of school throughout the entire year OR
• No more than two days per month on average
  • • This includes excused absences

Chronic absenteeism is when students have lower than 90% attendance during the school year.

• There is growing consensus of research that points to chronic absenteeism as one of the most overlooked indicators that a student will become disengaged, fall behind academically, fail courses, and eventually drop out of school.

ATTENDANCE IN OUR DISTRICT

Our goal for attendance is to increase the overall percentage of students attending school 90% or more. 

We know students who attend school regularly see more opportunities for success and we want to partner with you to support you in making sure your student has access to whatever they need to get to school on time every day!

• In the school year 2022-2023, 64.0% of students attended 90% or more of the year.
   
• Average attendance in our district was 92.2% prior to the pandemic. In 2021-2022, our attendance rate was 88.5%. Last year, our overall attendance rate rose halfway to pre-pandemic rates ending at 90.4%.
   
• Chronic absences — missing 10 percent or more of school days due to absence for any reason—excused, unexcused absences and suspensions—increased by about 32% in our district from 2019 to 2023.