Chronic Absenteeism: The Journey toward Improved Attendance and Achievement in a Rural Elementary School

This study examined a school’s improvement efforts to reduce chronic absenteeism in a rural, high-poverty elementary school. Through improvement science, it analyzed the effects of attendance interventions on attendance improvement. It is well known that students who do not regularly attend school will also struggle with adequate progress and growth in multiple subject areas. This study aimed to use Multi- Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) to conduct specific attendance-based interventions and then evaluate their effectiveness in one rural high-poverty elementary school. It also analyzed the effect of attendance on literacy achievement measured by Acadience data. How can an elementary school post-Covid19 increase attendance and create the achievement results necessary for student success? This improvement science project examined effective strategies to increase regular student attendance. Advisor: Sarah J. Zuckerman