Are you wondering about the best ways to visualize your district’s chronic absence data? If yes, use our newly updated free quantitative data tools, designed for school districts. These tools, known as the DATTs (District Attendance Tracking Tools) and SATTs (School Attendance Tracking Tools) are self-calculating Excel spreadsheets accompanied by handbooks with guidance. School districts can paste in student attendance data and receive an analysis of chronic absence rates by school, grade and racial and ethnic breakdowns, as well as a list of absentee students. Read more to understand why these updated tools matter and how they can be used.
1. Why were the DATTs and SATTs created?
In 2011, very few people or district staff had ever heard the term chronic absence. Attendance Works and Applied Survey Research developed these free tools to help districts calculate chronic absence rates district-wide and for each school. Embedded with formulas, tables and charts, the DATTs and SATTs are designed to work with any student information system. They are organized into four modules for grades PreK-5 (elementary), K-5 (elementary), 6-8 (middle) and 9-12 (high), and can accommodate up to 65,000 students. We also have spreadsheets that combine all grades into a single district profile.
While many school districts have now developed the ability to calculate chronic absence rates, our data tools are especially effective for smaller districts with more limited data capacity. They can offer staff insights into which student groups need immediate intervention while saving time. In addition, they provide districts of all sizes with powerful data visualizations that can serve as a model for reports to incorporate into their real-time data dashboards.
2. How much do the DATTs and SATTs cost? As with all previous versions, the DATTs and SATTs are free of charge. Those wishing to access them can register here.
3. How have the DATTs and SATTs been updated? Attendance Works updated the DATTs and SATTs to ensure the tools can capture new patterns and developments related to chronic absence. Key changes include:
- A new attendance band: The DATTs and SATTs now include an acute chronic absence (missing 50% or more days) attendance band. Read below to learn more about the rationale behind using attendance bands. The acute chronic absence category was added to help capture the growing number of students who now are absent for even greater proportions of the school year. As this study shows, this phenomenon happened in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic.
- New Reports: The DATTs and SATTs enable districts to run a variety of reports that show trends in chronic absence. We’ve updated the reports to allow districts to ask the following questions, and added a new collection option:
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- How many students are in each attendance band?
- What is the makeup of chronically absent students?
- What percentage of chronically absent students are designated McKinney-Vento?
- A new third option to the “gender” category that allows districts to collect decline to state.
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4. Why do the DATTs and SATTs use “bands” of attendance to categorize students?
We created bands to make it more manageable for schools to put in place a tiered approach to improve student attendance and engagement. The tiered approach begins with prevention for all students. Students with higher levels of absence receive more intensive interventions supported by school, community or public agency staff with the skills to address their needs. We have organized student attendance into the following five bands, below.
Satisfactory attendance: (missing 0-5.9% of days).This band reflects the fact that only missing a few days of school during the course of an entire year is not a problem. We also recognize that students will stay home when they are too sick to be in school.
At-risk attendance: (missing 6-9%) Research shows that this level of absence is associated with a decline in academic performance so it merits attention.
Moderate chronic absence (missing 10%-19%) is chronically absent. For a discussion of this cut point, you can access the following studies: “Present, Engaged and Accounted For” (2008), “What Matters for Staying on Track and Graduating in Chicago Public High Schools” (2007), “Absences Add Up” (2014).
Severe chronic absence: (missing 20%-49%) Although there is no research to support this cut point, experience suggests that this level of absence requires a more intensified and specialized approach to supporting the student and their family.
Acute chronic absence: (missing 50% or more) This band was recently added based on trends following the pandemic that show more students are missing greater numbers of school days. Like students with severe chronic absence, the “acute” band suggests students need an even more intense and interagency intervention. We use the term “acute” rather than “extreme” for these student attendance bands in order to avoid confusion with the school-level bands that we use when we analyze national chronic absence data.
5. Is it important to examine levels of chronic absence for schools in addition to bands of attendance for students? Yes. The summary charts included in the DATTs and SATTs can be used to see the overall level of chronic absence by schools. Districts can use this information to consider which schools need more support.
Higher levels of school wide chronic absence affect the educational experience of all students. The churn from students in the classroom makes it harder for teachers to teach and set classroom norms while students must wait for their absent peers to catch up. This can be seen in a study of elementary schools in Delaware, showing that high overall levels of absence in kindergarten through 3rd grade had an even more adverse impact on student learning than individual absences.
6. Why does the attendance band for schools with the highest level of chronic absence shown in the national data analyses differ from the band used for students with the highest level of chronic absence in the DATTs and SATTs?
In our analysis of national data, we divided schools into the following categories based on school-wide levels of chronic absence: extreme (30% or more of students chronically absent); high (20-29%); significant (10-19%); modest (5-9%); and, low (less than 5%). We developed these categories in partnership with researchers at Johns Hopkins University. To reduce confusion, we are using “acute” instead of “extreme” for the band that reflects the highest level of chronic absence for students in the DATTs and SATTs.