October 2009

Letter from the Editor

“Attendance Is About Relationships. If You Build Them, They Will Come.”

Thus reads the signature on e-mails from the author of this month’s Feature Article, Frederic Bolton, Attendance Director of a large school district in Colorado that has markedly improved attendance over the last several years. Bolton used a careful analysis of attendance data to target an intervention, and streamlined absence codes to make them consistent across schools. For school districts interested in revamping their own attendance codes, a guide entitled “Every School Day Counts” by the National Forum on Education Statistics, linked in the Resources and Research section, might help.

Relationships are the theme, also, of a new program to combat violence in Chicago Public Schools by improving at-risk students’ ties to mentors, counselors and social workers in historically tough schools. Strategy of the Month will tell you more.

For profiles of eight individual high schools that have boosted their graduation rates, see Axelrod’s report on Community Schools linked in Resources and Research.

September has flown past, and October is well under way. How to Evaluate Your Truancy Reduction Program is coming up quickly, but spots are still open; another announcement in the Conferences section. And the president of the National Center for School Engagement, Dr. Ken Seeley, will be a keynote speaker at the American School Health Association Conference.

Jodi Heilbrunn,

Newsletter Editor

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Colorado School District Turns
Attendance Around: Here’s How
By
Frederick Bolton, Director of Attendance,

Mesa County Valley School District 51

Mesa County Valley School District 51 began its truancy reduction initiative in the 2001-2002 school-year. We are the third largest school district in the state with approximately 22,000 students. Our first task was to gain an understanding of what we were dealing with in relation to truancy and other related issues such as dropouts. That year a complete analysis was done of our district’s attendance policies, procedures, building level practices, and our attendance database system. The attendance data for all schools K-12 for the previous year was analyzed and disaggregated to identify how big our problem was. At that time, we had a 21% habitual truancy rate with percent average daily attendance in the low 80’s.
At the end of 2002 a complete analysis of the year’s attendance data was performed along with analysis of qualitative data gathered during home visit interviews of truant students, students on probation and incarcerated youth. From these data, we calculated frequency statistics to identify levels of educational and social risk based on a student’s rate of truancy. Early data in the 2003-2004 school year indicated two major areas of concern: students transitioning to 6^th and 9^th grades. These data also showed that 9^th grade students who had missed 25% or more of the first thirty days of school were at risk of dropping out.

Our board policies were out of alignment with state statute and our procedures and building level practices were in conflict with best practices. In addition, our attendance database system was not uniform and contained inaccurate codes that in some cases were deceptive. By December of 2001 we established a plan to overhaul our attendance system from top to bottom.

We conducted a district wide survey to locate any best practices that were in place, and with help from our attorneys we rewrote board policy where necessary. We developed new procedures and building level practices and held a focus group with parents of truant youth to gain their insight as to why we were failing with this issue. All community stakeholders were surveyed as well. From this input we designed a master plan to address truancy and dropout. All attendance codes were redefined and reduced in number to insure accuracy of data and consistent application.

Using these data we developed a plan to target initial truancy reduction efforts at 4^th, 5^th, 8^th and 9^th grades. After only one year, elementary school habitual truancy was reduced by 91%, middle school habitual truancy by 83% and high school habitual truancy by 43%. Percent average daily attendance rose to the high 80’s and habitual truancy dropped to 7%. Currently, our district’s average daily attendance is 91% and habitual truancy rages from 3% to 5.5% depending on the time of year. Our dropout rate is one of the lowest in the state.

To achieve this progress three things were done. First, we performed an accurate analysis of our district with no sacred cows allowed. Changes were made regardless of historical practice. If it didn’t produce results, it was discontinued, and all changes were supported by data. Second, all parents of truant youth were invited to school to meet face to face to plan strategies on how best to meet their students’ needs and reduce absenteeism. This required administrators to take a proactive personal approach and meant hundreds of meetings for each administrator. Third, we restructured and renamed an old position to create a Director of Attendance to conduct home visits and prosecute severe truancy cases in court. Ongoing research indicated that most truancy was the result of family difficulties, so after the fourth year of implementation we developed a new process in which a collaborative community assessment team develops treatment plans to which families may be court ordered. Ninety-five percent of our district court cases now end with the student returning to school and being educationally successful.

Our current research is guiding us in identifying educational dropouts as young as third grade. In addition, we are utilizing high school dropout prediction statistics to identify potential high school dropouts and provide early intervention and support which should further reduce our dropout rate. Our current goal is to reduce our already lower dropout rate by another 50% over the next two years. All of this progress was achieved without the use of grants or additional new monies. Research and statistics can be accessed on our website.

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An About-Face for Zero Tolerance in
Chicago Public Schools
By
Jodi Heilbrunn

Ron Huberman of Chicago Public Schools has a plan for turning around the crisis in violence among Chicago students. In a shocking increase, 34 students were killed last year and another 290 were shot, although none died within school buildings. By analyzing data on 500 shootings of students over the last five years, Huberman’s team identified a profile of students most likely to be victimized. Compared to the overall student population, victims were more likely to: be academically off-track; miss many days of school; qualify for special education; live in unstable homes; be black. Regular readers of this newsletter may not be surprised to learn that the largest difference between victims and students overall was in the proportion that was academically off-track. While just nine percent of all students were off-track, 53% of the victims were behind. And while students on average missed 16% of school days, victims had missed 42% of days. Least predictive was living in unstable homes, since only seven percent of victims compared to five percent of all students were categorized as such.

The team also identified differences in schools that experienced the greatest versus the least amount of violence. The least violent schools were those that spent more money per student on counselors, social workers and training for security staff, and were much less likely to call the police over fights or drugs on campus.

Armed with these data and a good deal of funding, Huberman’s team devised a plan to serve the most at-risk schools and students. In a $30 million operation, the 38 schools that experienced the most violence during the study years will receive more counselors and social workers, and will be assisted in re-crafting their discipline procedures to move away from zero-tolerance approaches. Since the increase in violence has been attributed to school closings that force members of rival gangs to attend school together, the district will guarantee safe passage to and from school for any student who must cross gang borders to attend school.

The team also identified the 1,200 students, and the top 200 of those, who are most likely to become shooting victims based on the statistical profile. The two hundred most at-risk students will be paired four to a full-time mentor who will act as role model and counselor, but also keep on top of the students’ attendance. As an enticement, each of these students will be guaranteed part-time paying jobs in the district.

We wish Chicago Public Schools, and most of all their students, success with this outside-the-box plan! For more information, see the Chicago Tribune and New York Times articles by Ahmed and Saulny in the Resources and Research section below.

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The Education World Grant Center lists lots of grant opportunities, many with open or revolving application deadlines.

Fundsnet Services lists grants in 28 categories. The Education and Literacy Grants category currently has 217 grants listed.

The School Funding Center has a free newsletter that includes a limited number of grant announcements and grant writing tips. It also advertises a huge database of grants to which you may subscribe for various periods of time for different rates ranging from $99 for two months to $397 for a year. Grants are available for schools and non-profits.

Teachers, go to Donors Choose to make requests for classroom supplies.

The Dollar General offers annual or bi-annual grants in five literacy areas:
· Adult Literacy Grants
· Back-To-School Grants
· Beyond Words: The Dollar General School Library Relief
Program
· Family Literacy Grants
· Youth Literacy Initiatives

SchoolGrants lists endless grant opportunities for K-12 schools, and has a page on grant writing tips. They also post examples of successful grant applications, both large and small, that readers have shared with them – and you! Use them to make your grant proposal stronger. They also offer a subscription to Schoolgrants Biweekly Newsletter for $45 a year.

RGK Foundation - The Foundation's programmatic areas of interest include Health, Education, Human Services, and Community Affairs. The Foundation's primary interests within education include formal K-12 education, literacy, and higher education.

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Ahmed, Azam, and Stephanie Banchero. (September 4, 2009.) “Huberman Strategy Takes Aim at Violence: City Schools to Work with the Students Most at Risk, Chicago Tribune.

Axelroth, R. (2009). The Community Schools Approach: Raising Graduation and College Going Rates—Community High School Case Studies. Washington, DC: Coalition for Community Schools, Institute for Educational Leadership.

DoSomething.org is a web page dedicated to helping kids – or adults for that matter – become activists. The homepage provides a long list of things a budding activist can do to raise awareness about an issue and steps that can be taken to address an issue. Among the topics specifically considered is high school dropout. The right side of the website lists “What’s Your Thing” topics with more information about 11 areas, one of which is education. There are lots of great resources there! Check it out, and if you’re a teacher, have your students check it out as well.

National Forum on Education Statistics. (2009). Every School Day Counts: The Forum Guide to Collecting and Using Attendance Data (NFES 2009–804). U.S. Department of Education. Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics
This Forum guide offers best practice suggestions on collecting and using student attendance data to improve performance. It includes a standard set of codes to make attendance data comparable across districts and states. There are real-life examples of how attendance information has been used by school districts.

Saulny, Susan. (October 7, 2009.) “Focus in Chicago: Students at Risk of Violence, New York Times, p. 1.

The National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) and the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund (MALDEF) are featuring on the NWLC website the results of their study of barriers to high school graduation facing Latinas. The report, Listening to Latinas, is based on interviews with Latinas. If the report is more than you want, there is also an executive summary, and there are 3-page fact sheets about what schools can do and about what state and local policy-makers can do to promote high school graduation for Latinas. And keep scrolling down the page – there are more resources than I can possibly list!

www.schoolengagement.org

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