BOE hears presentation on chronic absenteeism

LAVALLETTE — The Lavallette School District has developed a corrective action plan intended to address “chronic absenteeism” after school officials became aware that more than 10% of enrolled students are chronically absent — meaning that they have missed an average two or more school days per month.

Michael Hajisafari, head teacher at Lavallette Elementary School, presented this corrective action plan to the board of education at its meeting on Tuesday, March 19.

According to Mr. Hajisafari, the corrective action plan is mandatory for schools that surpass the 10% chronic absenteeism threshold.

“This year, we need to have a corrective action plan focusing on chronic absenteeism for Lavallette School,” he said, citing a requirement outlined in N.J.S.A. 18A:38-25.1. “Our goal is to reduce chronic absenteeism in the Lavallette School District to under the 10% threshold.”

According to the statute, “In the event that 10% or more of the students enrolled in a public school are chronically absent, the school shall develop a corrective action plan to improve absenteeism rates.”

“The corrective action plan shall include, but need not be limited to…identifying problems and barriers to school attendance; developing recommendations to address the problems and barriers…outlining communication strategies to educate and inform parents on the importance of school attendance; establishing protocols on informing and engaging parents when a child begins to show a pattern of absences; and reviewing school policies to ensure that they support improved school attendance,” it continues.

According to Mr. Hajisafari, chronic absenteeism is seen by educators as a primary cause of academic issues, in addition to predicting dropout rates.

“[Chronic absenteeism] is the primary cause of low academic achievement and it’s a projection for future dropout,” he said. “A student in New Jersey is typically declared chronically absent if they have 18 or more excused and/or unexcused absences. So, if they’re out sick it still plays a factor in if they’re chronically absent for that school year.”

Mr. Hajisafari then introduced the corrective plan itself, beginning with identifying the data on the school’s absenteeism rates.

During the 2021-2022 school year, he said, 15.8% of the student body were considered chronically absent. In 2022-2023, that number had risen to nearly 21% of the district. “So, 20% of our student body have been out of school for at least 10% of those days. And, again, the goal is to get that number all the way back down to 10%,” he said.

The relevant state statute also says that part of this responsibility includes soliciting input from students’ parents, which Mr. Hajisafari did by conducting a survey.

“A couple weeks ago, I sent out a school-wide survey to our parents and guardians,” he said. “The survey included questions related to the parents’ beliefs regarding the reason why students are chronically absent and recommendations how to improve our attendance within our school. We got a total of 34 responses.”

He also explained that the survey included statements, which the respondents were asked to rate on a scale of one to five how much they agree with the statement, with one being strong disagreement and five being strong agreement. These statements included things like “My child feels safe in the school,” which 73% of parents rated a five, and “Students at Lavallette School respect the teachers and staff members,” which Mr. Hajisafari said is one area he identified as needing improvement.

“I thought this was kind of interesting — there was a high percentage on that five scale, but we still had some parents responding all between one and four,” he said. “That’s something I feel like we need to target — the respect level of staff.”

He also included two open-ended questions that allowed parents to write their own responses: “Why do you think students tend to have high absent percentages?” and “What recommendations do you suggest to better improve attendance at Lavallette School?” He read some responses to these questions anonymously.

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