Chronic absenteeism hasn’t gotten a lot of attention this legislative session. I can understand why given the nature of some high-profile and potentially earth-shaking bills that have soaked up much of the public conversation around what Indiana lawmakers may do in relation to education.

Yet chronic absenteeism is one of those seemingly intractable issues that plays an outsized role in student success. After all, if a student isn’t attending school, the quality of their school becomes almost irrelevant as to their academic progress.

So while there are two bills that touch on chronic absenteeism still under consideration by the Indiana legislature (and I’ll cover them briefly below), there’s also a new report that digs deep into the practices of six Indianapolis schools to look at what they are doing to reduce chronic absenteeism.

A Brief Look at Legislation Under Consideration

Two bills remain under consideration, with one having passed through the Senate and one having passed through the House. I don’t expect all of them to move forward though I do expect something to ultimately be put forward and, very likely, pass, since dealing with chronic absenteeism is pretty much universally seen as a good thing and I don’t see any of the tactics being put forward in legislation this year as controversial.

Senate Bill 482

SB 482 formally defines chronic absenteeism and requires that the DOE “establish a categorization framework to distinguish between excused and unexcused absences based on the reason for the absence.”

To my understanding, differentiating excused and unexcused absences is something that schools already do in something like their code of conduct or a student/parent handbook. It seems like the move here is to standardize what belongs in each category statewide, which is another reasonable move in my estimation.

House Bill (HB) 1201

HB 1201 is an omnibus bill that builds on the categorization framework proposed in SB 482. Beyond establishing best practice recommendations and a categorization framework, it also directs schools to “adopt policies in line with the department’s categorization framework” and “prohibits a public school from expelling or suspending a student solely because the student is chronically absent of a habitual truant.”

The Current State of Chronic Absenteeism

Before diving into the report, some quick background. What does it mean for a student to be chronically absent? The typical definition is when a student misses at least 10% of an academic year. Using the rough estimate of 180 academic days, that means chronically absent students miss at least 18 days. That’s almost an entire month of school days.

The pandemic, as it did for so many educational measures, exacerbated Indiana’s rate of chronic absenteeism, ballooning it to a peak of 21.2% in 2022. Nearly 1 in 5 students missed about a month of school that year. Indiana’s rate is trending in a more positive direction (it stood at 17.8% in 2024), but much work remains.

And, like is the case for so many educational measures, chronic absenteeism does not hit all student groups equally. For example, 23.7% of low-income students met the chronically absent benchmark last year compared to just 13% of students who do not qualify as low-income.

How Schools are Addressing the Issue

Now to the report, titled “Reducing Chronic Absenteeism,” and recently released by local nonprofit The Mind Trust in partnership with Allegiant Prep Academy, Christel House Indianapolis, Enlace Academy, Herron Preparatory Academy, Indiana Math and Science Academy – West, and Monarca Academy.

The report offers a miniature case study of each school and smartly looks across all six schools to extract some key best practices they have in common. Those best practices fall into these four buckets: 1) School culture, 2) Clear policies and procedures, 3) An ability to swiftly diagnose and address problems, and 4) Collaboration with families and the wider community.

I recommend reading each school’s section of the report in full since they are packed with both quantitative and qualitative data points that make each school’s efforts really come alive. But for the purposes of brevity here, I’ll highlight an element that I found notable about how each school tackles chronic absenteeism and which each connect back to one or more of the four keys noted above (though in reading each school’s section, it’s clear they all embrace the best practices noted above).

Allegiant Prep Academy

The report notes, “When students are absent, Allegiant Prep views this as an indicator of one of two potential challenges: external barriers preventing students from attending, which the school seeks to address and resolve, or issues within the school’s culture that require improvement to foster a welcoming and engaging environment where students are motivated to attend regularly.”

Too often, I think schools assume an enrolled student will show up. And when they don’t, the instinct is to look for external barriers as the explanation. While those often do stop students from attending, the level of candid introspection built into how Allegiant handles chronic absenteeism is laudable.

One of their leaders is quoted in the report saying, “I think sometimes when we think about attendance we think just about outputs. As a community, we have to start thinking about the inputs. I think attendance starts with the ethos of the school and students feeling safe and the best version of themselves, not just physically but socially and emotionally. That makes kids want to come to school.”

Christel House Indianapolis

Chronic absenteeism rates tend to be higher at the high school level. And within grades 9-12, the pointiest end of the stick is senior year. Across Indiana, about 33% of seniors are chronically absent. While Christel House as a network serves students in K-12, they’ve placed particular emphasis on addressing the barriers and challenges inherent to their high school population.

One way they do this is through a daily advisory program, starting in ninth grade, that matches each student with a mentor. This mentor stays with the student for all four years of high school and becomes a trusted point of contact during a student’s high school journey.

Beyond that, Christel House embraces restorative discipline practices that keep students in the building. One leader put it this way: “We try to avoid reactive and exclusionary discipline at all costs. At some of my previous schools I’ve had a lot of negative experiences with students having long suspensions and just not coming back.” Another leader added, “We try to think about what is the behavior and is the suspension really going to correct that behavior?”

Enlace Academy

Remember how chronic absenteeism rates soared across Indiana during the pandemic? Well, that trend certainly played out at Enlace, where their rates peaked at 34% in 2022. Remarkably, their rate fell to 16% in 2024, which puts them below the state average. The turnaround was no accident.

Deep family relationships are at the core of everything Enlace does. With a student body that is about 80% Hispanic, building and maintaining those relationships has been central to addressing what otherwise threatened to become an out-of-control issue. This is summed up in one leader’s quote that “Everyone in the building is responsible for student attendance.” Another explained, “There’s not a science to reducing chronic absenteeism. It’s relationship building, knowing your families, and looking at the data.”

Herron Preparatory Academy

Herron Preparatory Academy is dogged about proactively addressing why various students might be absent. Leadership meets weekly for the express purpose of reviewing attendance data, discussing barriers facing students, tailoring solutions to individual student’s needs, and assigning outreach responsibilities.

One leader said, “Through these team meetings, we can effectively triage various reasons for student absences and assign the most appropriate team member to provide targeted support to families.”

Indiana Math and Science Academy – West

Indiana Math and Science Academy (IMSA) – West is unabashed about its school model and what kind of student it is designed for. For the past three years, they have held the honor of being a certified STEM school per the Indiana Department of Education. STEM is woven into everything the school is and does. And this ethos shows up in how they engage students and families through the breadth and depth of opportunities and clubs and field trips they offer students during school and outside of normal school hours.

The school is clear about its purpose, which shows up in how families and educators experience the school. In the words of one leader, “At IMSA West, students and teachers are actually excited to be here.”

Monarca Academy

While every school in this report works hard to ensure their staff and leaders reflect the full diversity of their student body, Monarca is especially quick to emphasize just how much that matters. It is inherent to their school model as a place that was founded and designed with Hispanic students and the immigrant student experience in mind (their student body is about 95% Hispanic).

“I think that representation has a lot to do with our success,” a leader noted. “We try to make sure our teachers and our leaders are a reflection of our students.”

An Art, Not a Science

As one leader noted in a quote above, addressing chronic absenteeism is not a science. There’s no simple set of steps you can follow to ensure that every student attends school. Yet there are clear best practices that, taken together as an intricate tapestry, can help ensure students both get to school and ultimately succeed once they get there.