Chronic Absence: A Sign to Invest in Conditions for Learning

Abstract Chronic absence—a combination of students missing school, getting pushed out, dropping out, and being suspended—signals barriers to learning, both external and internal to school. Outside the schoolhouse walls, community barriers to regular attendance include challenges such as insufficient access to health services, unstable housing conditions, and community violence. A school’s environment also affects attendance. Conditions for learning (CFL) comprise the pertinent aspects of an environment that lead to engagement or disengagement: physical and emotional safety; connectedness and access to equitable supports; challenging and relevant instruction; and the social and emotional competence of peers and educators. Schools in which educators have the capacity to create and maintain a safe, supportive, and engaging environment for learning, as well as connect students and families to needed resources, suffer less from widespread chronic absence. The chapter discusses the educator capacity necessary to build engaging CFL to affect student engagement and attendance. Engaging CFL lay a foundation for a strong system of tiered interventions to decrease chronic absence, and the chapter concludes with a multitiered matrix of promising practices to improve attendance.