Urgency, shared responsibility and tailoring strategies to cut chronic absence in half
Hall’s Cross Roads Elementary School is a small, suburban community school located in the city of Aberdeen, Maryland, that serves 440 children, pre-K through 5th grade. Just over 90% of students qualify as economically disadvantaged.
Last year, in the 2024-25 school year, Hall’s Cross Roads reduced its chronic absence rate to 15%, down from the 44% rate two years earlier. This current rate is even lower than its prepandemic chronic absence level of approximately 22%. The school’s academic success has grown at the same time: student reading achievement has doubled within two years in part because the students are coming to school.
Karen Jankowiak became the principal at the start of the 2023-2024 school year and was joined by Amanda Coyne, community school specialist. Based on the data, addressing chronic absence became the priority.
During a webinar hosted by the Maryland State Department of Education, Karen Jankowiak and Amanda Coyne shared how they were able to build upon what already existed to make significant improvements. Below are key insights.
Leveraging a sense of urgency
The two new leaders noticed a lack of urgency around the school’s high chronic absence levels and low math and reading scores. “Attendance needed to be that first intervention,” said Jankowiak. “We had to create a sense of urgency, and it had to become part of the culture, not just the conversation.” The principal set out to shift the thinking around chronic absence and student achievement among the entire school community and outside partners. “We realized that we had to have high expectations for students, we had to have clear expectations for adults and we had to have accountability rooted in support but not fear,” Jankowiak said.
Jankowiak and Coyne involved the entire school and its attendance team in supporting the new culture. “The culture changed in our school because our leadership behaviors changed,” said Jankowiak. “And when I say leadership, it wasn’t just the proud principal or the community school specialist. It was shared leadership amongst our entire staff.”
This urgency around attendance needed to be shared with the school families as well. “It really was helping our parents understand the importance of attending school every day,” said the principal. They showed photos of high school students in graduation caps and gowns with families at back-to-school night. The goal was to help their families understand that when kids are chronically absent, they’re not reading, they’re not writing and they’re not doing math. The school shared with families that by allowing their child to miss school, it created a “Swiss cheese of learning for students,” which could mean they may not be able to drive a car, work at a job or graduate.
Assessing and modifying strategies
When the two leaders joined the school, many staff members were proud of the things that were being done but they hadn’t yet used data to assess if their efforts had the intended result. Jankowiak and Coyne made sure their conversations with staff were anchored on data. Attendance and chronic absence data is analyzed every single day at Hall’s Cross Roads.
A closer look at strategies offered surprising findings. For example, the Rise and Shine program, designed to provide a bus ride to school for students who were missing 10% or more days, actually increased absenteeism and tardiness. How? A closer look at the data found that many of the students who were chronically absent typically walked to school. When the non-chronically absent students heard their neighbors were offered a bus to school, they wanted to ride the bus too. Which led to families keeping their children home for a week to “qualify” for the rise and shine bus. The solution? Jankowiak and Coyne created a walking school bus for all students living within one mile of the site. “It was a very small fraction of what was paid for transportation, and kids are now enjoying walking to school,” Jankowiak said.
While the school had established a school-wide approach to Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) there didn’t appear to be significant improvements in behavior in the building. The school realized they had to do a better job explaining that the incentives were awarded for positive behavior. Students had chances to win prizes in their classrooms, pop-up assemblies and school-wide assemblies. The school moved away from offering all extrinsic rewards to creating an experience approach to rewarding students. Students began to pick experiences that highlighted their respectful and responsible behaviors. They could choose to be a cafeteria helper, morning greeter, office helper or participate in lunch with staff members. Families were now invited to assemblies to recognize their child’s positive behavior.
To date, 85.5% of students have not required adult intervention or what is often referred to as an office referral. Students of the Month are now celebrated in the hallways with their pictures. Students with perfect attendance are recognized at the PBIS assemblies; assemblies were scheduled for days with typically low attendance. Creating a culture of pride and student responsibility has improved attendance throughout the school.
In addition to PBIS modifications, educators ramped up activities to celebrate attendance improvements. Daily attendance percentages were announced and cheered. The school communicated the expectation that 95% of the students must attend each day; if this goal was achieved everyone was invited to a dance party. Students heard slogans including “Strive for 95” or “If you don’t want to be behind, don’t miss more than 9 [days].” Children with perfect attendance were recognized monthly with various incentives. Students with 95% attendance or better were celebrated quarterly with an experience, and students and families with 97% attendance or better were celebrated each semester with a field trip.
Ensuring PD supports quality instruction
When they looked at how professional development (PD) for teachers was scheduled, they found it resulted in challenges for quality instruction. Rotating PD and coaching were regularly happening in the school, and teachers were pulled out of their classrooms while a substitute teacher led the class. This didn’t allow for consistent instruction in those classes.
The school made a number of refinements to its PD delivery, such as not having coaching cycles happen during the day, as well as looking for other opportunities to pay teachers for PD before or after school. “It was about protecting the time when kids were in school and sharpening the instruction,” the principal said.
Recognizing there is no silver bullet
The successes at Hall’s Cross Roads Elementary School illustrates how reducing chronic absence is possible. This didn’t involve brand new interventions or the adoption of a single silver bullet strategy. Rather it was made possible by strong leadership at the school and a well-organized attendance team, with everyone dedicated to improving student outcomes by taking a holistic approach.
The school attendance team included a full-time pupil personnel worker, community school specialist, behavior coach, Title I teacher specialist, school counselor and a Judy Center family coordinator. This team met weekly and were assigned grade levels to monitor attendance. Homeroom teachers used an Attendance Tracker to help the team identify reasons for absences and help facilitate family support.
Moving the needle on attendance also involved leaders regularly reviewing their data to examine whether interventions were working, identifying the barriers to regular attendance, and refining approaches to address the barriers they see in their local community. They also used their data to see how resources could be aligned to ensure school is a place where students wanted to be and had the supports in place to overcome barriers to attendance. School leaders worked to ensure both staff and families understood that regular attendance is key to learning and well-being, and were engaged in addressing chronic absence as an urgent issue. To learn more, watch a recording of their presentation.