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Wednesday, September 25, 2024: Leadership for Sustainability: Superintendents Making a Difference
In this webinar, superintendents from Columbus, Ohio, Topeka, Kansas and Livingston, California will share how they are achieving reductions in chronic absence – post-pandemic – in very different types of communities.
Speakers will share their top strategies and lessons learned about equipping schools to take a data-informed approach. They will describe how they have gained support from strategic partners and are sustaining their efforts over time. These inspiring examples will illustrate what is possible with leadership from superintendents.
You’ll hear key takeaways from recently completed research from an Ad Council Research Institute survey on how parents of K-12 students view education and school absences. The findings – and a new toolkit – will provide a deeper look into how to best develop messaging to motivate families to send their children to school in person. The findings and toolkit are most effective when used in tandem with a comprehensive, multi-pronged approach to address chronic absenteeism.
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Wednesday, August 7, 2024: Creating a Culture of Belonging and Engagement: Principals In Action
While chronic absence levels are starting to decrease in many places, rates are still much higher than pre-pandemic. Although everyone can help ensure students show up to class every day, the leadership role that a principal plays is irreplaceable.
In our third Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar, school leaders will share inspiring insights about what works to engage students and families as we continue to recover from the pandemic’s impact.
Speakers will explore how the transition to school in the fall can be leveraged to nurture engagement, nourish relationships and cultivate a routine of regular attendance. They’ll discuss how they are using lessons learned from the prior school year to inform their back-to-school strategies. We’ll also consider how schools and districts can focus on helping students stay healthy and avoid unnecessary absences. Attendance Works will share a new resource to help families decide whether their child is too sick to go to school.
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Wednesday, May 15, 2024: Essential Partnerships for Showing Up: Families, Youth and Community
Join Attendance Works, the Institute for Educational Leadership and our campaign partners for the second 2024 Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar, with the theme, Be Present, Be Powerful!
What is driving the continued high levels of chronic absenteeism, and how are the lingering effects of the pandemic affecting student and family engagement? What works to re-establish the positive conditions for learning in schools that motivate students to attend?
In this webinar we’ll explore insights learned and answers to these questions. Inspiring speakers will highlight how schools and districts can co-create meaningful solutions that build upon the insights and strengths of youth, families and community partners, including health partners.
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Wednesday, April 3, 2024: On the Front Line: The Crucial Role of Teachers
Join Attendance Works, the Institute for Educational Leadership and our campaign partners as we kick off the 2024 Attendance Awareness Campaign with the theme, Be Present, Be Powerful!
Is your community struggling with parents, caregivers and students who may not understand why showing up in person every day matters for well-being, learning and achievement? Are you leveraging the power of teachers — who are in contact with kids every day — to make a difference?
During this first of four Attendance Awareness Campaign webinars, we will explore how districts, principals, school staff, families and the community can assist and equip teachers to forge relationships with students and their families. We’ll share strategies that can be folded into the regular school day that will help teachers build awareness about why showing up matters. A diverse panel of teachers and school site leaders will share how teachers are making a difference and what are the conditions, including district supported health services, that allow teachers to play this frontline role.
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Wednesday, September 27, 2023: Sustaining Success: Investing in Showing Up
Join Attendance Works, the Institute for Educational Leadership and our campaign partners for the fourth and final webinar for the 2023 Attendance Awareness Campaign with the theme, Showing Up Together!
This webinar will highlight three evidence-based practices for reducing chronic absence: home visiting, success mentoring and school nurses. Drawing upon insights from colleagues working in New York, Connecticut and Washington, we will explore how these strategies can be implemented effectively. We will also examine the role that partnerships, diverse funding sources and policy play in sustaining and expanding the work over time.
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Wednesday, August 9, 2023: A Welcoming and Healthy Return to School: Ensuring Showing Up
Join Attendance Works, the Institute for Educational Leadership and our campaign partners as we continue the 2023 Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar series with the theme, Showing Up Together!
Based on data from a number of states, chronic absenteeism appears to have doubled nationwide and absence levels remain high. Moving forward with success requires purposefully rebuilding school communities that create a sense of belonging and ensure students and families receive the support they need to engage, attend and learn.
This third of four webinars will focus on creating a supportive and welcoming environment that encourages a sense of connection and community as students and families return to school. Speakers will offer strategies for reaching out to students, especially in transition grades, cultivating a school-wide culture of attendance, and ensuring positive conditions for learning are in place when school doors open. We will share a new health resource for families with clear guidance on when students should stay home and when they should attend school.
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Wednesday, May 10, 2023: Relationships All Year Round: Nurturing Showing Up
Join Attendance Works, the Institute for Educational Leadership and our campaign partners as we continue the 2023 Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar series with the theme, Showing Up Together!
This second of four Attendance Awareness Campaign webinars will focus on the importance of intentionally cultivating caring relationships with students and families, over time, as a crucial foundation for engagement. Speakers will explore barriers to showing up and how they are using data to determine what works given new realities.
We’ll share the newly updated Attendance Playbook, developed with FutureEd, and unveil new Count Us In! toolkit resources to support local Attendance Awareness Campaigns.
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Thursday, March 30, 2023: Belonging and Engagement: The Keys to Showing Up
Join Attendance Works, the Institute for Educational Leadership and our campaign partners as we kick off the 2023 Attendance Awareness Campaign, with the theme, Showing Up Together! Since the beginning of the pandemic, chronic absence has doubled nationwide and affected nearly one out of three students by the end of the last school year. Early data from fall 2022 suggests it remains extraordinarily high. These continued elevated rates reflect the devastating impact on students and families from three years of disrupted learning as well as on-going health, economic and social challenges.
Changing this trajectory requires a strategic, long-term approach grounded in a deep understanding of the attendance barriers facing students and families as well as looking at data to determine where we must reinvest in positive conditions for learning.
In the first of four Attendance Awareness Campaign webinars, we’ll hear from a diverse panel of practitioners about how we can increase attendance, engagement and a sense of belonging by drawing upon the assets that are now available in schools and communities. Speakers will explore what is possible before the school year ends, and will share strategies for connecting students experiencing chronic absence to fun learning experiences that rekindle the joy of learning during the summer.
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Wednesday, September 28, 2022: What Works to Sustain Engagement and Attendance?
Join us for the fourth and final Attendance Awareness Campaign 2022 webinar to hear about promising and proven local and state strategies for engaging students and families and reducing chronic absence.
Speakers from Connecticut, Baltimore, Maryland and the Menominee Nation in Wisconsin will share how they use data to inform action, engage local partners, and build capacity to ensure their approaches both achieve results and are sustainable. They will offer insights about how to draw upon the cultures, languages and assets of students, families and nearby communities to strengthen their interventions and programs.
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Wednesday, August 3, 2022: Ensuring a Welcoming, Healthy and Restorative Start to School
The new school year is a crucial opportunity for establishing a warm, welcoming and restorative school climate that motivates showing up to school every day. Join us for this 3rd Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar to learn about strategies that create belonging and connection for students and families. You’ll also hear about approaches that schools, districts and community partners can put in place to support the physical and emotional health and safety of students, families and school staff.
Speakers will share lessons learned and tools for helping students overcome barriers to getting to class, as well as strategies that enlist the entire school community in promoting a positive and engaging learning environment. They will show how they leveraged quantitative and qualitative data to inform action. Investing in the welcome back to school this fall is more important than ever, especially for students who faced the greatest challenges and had the least access to educational opportunities during the Covid-19 pandemic.
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Wednesday, May 25, 2022: What Promotes Engagement and Attendance? Insights from Students, Parents and Educators,
Join Attendance Works, IEL and our campaign partners for the second webinar in our 2022 Attendance Awareness Campaign. Speakers will share lessons learned from the past year about how to keep students connected, engaged and showing up for learning.
Grounding solutions in the experiences of those most affected by educational inequities exacerbated by the pandemic is essential to recovery. During this webinar, we will hear insights gained from students, parents or caregivers, and educators about the barriers – including those related to coping with the pandemic – that they experienced over the past year. Speakers will share their views on what works to cultivate engagement and attendance, and will discuss how to support students so they participate in learning during the summer and through the fall.
Using your data is key to knowing where to invest recovery strategies. Learn how to leverage qualitative and quantitative data so you can assess whether your strategies are working and what could make them better.
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Wednesday, April 6, 2022: Keep Kids Engaged and Showing Up for Learning: Relationships, Routines and Partnerships
Join Attendance Works, IEL and our campaign partners as we kick off the 2022 Attendance Awareness Campaign, with the theme Stay Connected, Keep Learning! Schools, working with community partners, can strengthen relationships, social-emotional skills and promote daily attendance routines essential to student learning and well-being, especially given the challenges of the pandemic.
In this first webinar, a panel of diverse speakers from varying communities and organizations will examine how schools can leverage health services, expanded learning and a community schools approach that motivates students to be engaged and learning for the remainder of the year and throughout the summer. We will launch the 2022 Attendance Awareness Campaign and share the first installment of our NEW messaging and engagement toolkit.
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Wednesday, September 29, 2021: Supported: Leveraging Attendance Data to Ensure Ongoing Success
The return to school this fall is more challenging than anyone could have anticipated. The surge in Covid-19 cases is increasing the number of students who miss school. In addition, families hard hit by the pandemic and poverty continue to face barriers to attending class and may also experience enrollment hesitancy. Many students, unaccustomed to showing up in person, are still establishing regular routines of going to school.
In this webinar we explore what can be done at the local and state level to mitigate the impact of the pandemic and engage students and their families despite these difficult conditions. We examine how chronic absence data can be used to identify students, families and schools that need additional support. Drawing on the experiences of the past year and proven strategies used before the pandemic, speakers share how they are making a difference. Key approaches include home visiting, relationship-building, strategic communication with families and youth, collaboration with community partners, restorative approaches and creative use of technology.
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Wednesday, August 4, 2021: Welcomed: Embracing Students, Families and Educators in the New School Year
A successful return to school is essential to recovering from this past year’s unprecedented and challenging experiences. The first weeks back to school are an important time to strengthen and forge relationships, to rebuild routines and rituals, or make new ones to create community at school. Schools will need to pay attention to social and emotional wellness as well as assure families of the safety of in-person instruction. Building community at school will be especially important for students living in communities hard hit by Covid-19 and those showing up to a new school building for the first time. Schools will need to cultivate a feeling of belonging and connection for students in transition grades during the prior and upcoming school year.
Working together, educators, community partners and families can recoup and thrive, especially if they use their attendance data from the prior year to identify who needs additional outreach and assess if efforts to engage students and families are working. Our special guest speakers will discuss how a holistic approach to rebounding is more possible than ever before, given the growth of community schools, increase in school-connected health resources and availability of federal recovery funding.
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Wednesday, May 26, 2021: Engaged: Using Summer to Connect with Students and Families
Engaging students and families, especially those facing the biggest challenges from the pandemic, is essential for a successful return to school. Working together we can create a bridge to school, an intentional approach that utilizes the summer to create connection, a feeling of belonging and excitement about learning.
Join our second Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar to learn how schools, districts, public agencies and community partners can use their attendance and participation data to organize and tailor summer programming. Our speakers will share how they create opportunities for students to play and socialize with peers, engage in fun learning activities and practice the routine of showing up in person. You’ll hear about Covid-19 recovery funding to support summer programs and how to grow connections with expanded learning providers and other community partners. Summer is an ideal time to pilot and improve strategies that can be taken to scale during the year and to identify students and families who might need even more support to successfully transition to school in the fall.
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Wednesday, April 14, 2021: Committed: Supporting Attendance and Participation to the Very Last Day of School
Join Attendance Works, IEL and our campaign partners as we kick off the 2021 Attendance Awareness Campaign, with the theme Rebound with Attendance! Over the past year, tens of thousands of students have lost out on significant amounts of instruction and learning opportunities, especially those in communities hardest hit by Covid-19. Our theme “Rebound with Attendance” urges schools and communities to make use of their chronic absence data to address educational inequities in their recovery planning.
Strong, trusting relationships that create a feeling of belonging for students and families, combined with the utilization of attendance data, are fundamental to improving engagement. Our featured speakers will offer their experiences, insights and pioneering practices that can be used during the last months of school to sustain and expand the participation of students and families.
You’ll get a sneak peek into Attendance Works’ new engagement planning toolkit. Our free tools will help schools and district leaders — and their teams — put in place locally tailored strategies that ensure students, especially those experiencing the greatest challenges, show up to class so they can learn and thrive.
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Wednesday, September 30, 2020: Every Learning Opportunity Matters: Promising Strategies to Help Students Show Up
Ensuring students benefit from every learning opportunity is more essential than ever, especially given the educational inequities exacerbated by school closures last spring and the ongoing health and economic challenges created by Covid-19.
Our third and final 2020 Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar explores how community, district and school leaders are supporting student attendance and participation, whether lessons are in person, remote or a blend. Our speakers share promising approaches used by schools, districts and communities to engage and support students and families in this initial transition to school. We discuss their strategies and the implications for sustaining positive conditions for learning throughout the academic year.
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Wednesday, August 26, 2020: Equity at the Center: Strategies and Tools for Developing Better Learning Continuity and Attendance Plans
As we begin another school year affected by the Covid-19 pandemic, districts face significant challenges to ensuring all students receive the academic and social-emotional support needed to continue learning. While these circumstances are difficult, they also present an opportunity to think differently about how to pursue an equity-centered approach to student learning. This California-focused webinar presents strategies and tools for reimagining how districts, families and community-based organizations can work together.
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Wednesday, August 19, 2020: Creating an Engaging and Restorative Environment to Support Transitions to School
The start of the 2020-21 school year will be unprecedented due to social distancing, interrupted learning, and the loss of routine experienced by every member of the school community. How can districts and schools create caring and supportive school environments, in the midst of uncertainty, that encourage students and families to attend and participate in school?
Join our second Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar to examine what it means to address the effects of trauma while helping to reestablish the routine of school, whether it is in-person, remote or a blend. Hear about what families say they need from schools and educators to support their transition to school this fall and beyond. Speakers will discuss the importance of clear communications, how strong relationships support learning and engagement, and how many of the practices designed for students and families who’ve experienced trauma are suitable for the whole school community. We’ll focus on activities and strategies educators can put in place just before and during the first month of school, and the importance of using data to inform and tailor these transition activities.
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Wednesday, July 22, 2020: Data + Relationships to Support Transitions to School
Join Attendance Works, IEL and our partners as we kick off the 2020 Attendance Awareness Campaign. Our theme “Present, Engaged and Supported” recognizes that strong, trusting relationships that create belonging are fundamental to improving student attendance and participation.
This webinar will offer insights about what you can do to prepare for the return to class in the next few months, whether learning takes place at school, virtually or in some other form. You’ll learn about Attendance Works’ new transition planning materials. We will describe an expanded attendance data framework to identify which students are likely to begin the new school year significantly behind in their academic learning. We’ll also describe how plans can include investments in staff health and well-being.
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Friday, May 15, 2020: Engaging Students and Families During Covid-19
Connection with students and families is essential to having kids show up to learning whether it takes place remotely or in a brick and mortar building. In this webinar, co-sponsored by the Institute for Educational Leadership, we explore strategies for developing and strengthening relationships with students and families as part of distance learning, and how educators, school staff and partners can use this time to tend to students’ social and emotional needs. Our speakers discuss how they are using data to monitor participation, and how they have intervened when connections are lost or need to be reestablished. In addition, our speakers offer reflections about the educational inequities exacerbated by the pandemic, and how they will affect the transition back to school, whether lessons are virtual, in person or a blend.
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Tuesday, April 14, 2020: Reducing the Adverse Impact of the Coronavirus on Students and Families
Join us for a webinar with Healthy Schools Campaign and the Institute for Educational Leadership. Outreach that helps ensure students are supported and engaged while families shelter at home requires leadership and action from schools, districts and community partners. Learn about emerging practice and policy for addressing the adverse impact of school closures on students and families. Our guest presenters share strategies that emphasize family and student connection, promote physical and behavioral health and leverage the power of community schools. Find out how to use existing data (i.e. absences, behavior, academics, special education status and demographics) to target and tailor investments to students, families and schools, especially those in need of extra support.
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Thursday, April 9, 2020: Data + Relationships Can Strengthen Your School’s Response to COVID-19
This webinar was sponsored by the National Association of Elementary School Principals. Principals are uniquely positioned to take steps to engage and support students while families shelter at home. This webinar examines how you can team up with your staff to promote positive conditions of learning — ensuring students and families are physically and emotionally healthy, feel a sense of connection and belonging, and are academically engaged — even in a remote or virtual learning environment. Consider the value of using existing data collected prior to school closure, such as absences, behavior, academics (including special education) and demographics, to target and tailor resources for students and families, especially those facing additional challenges.
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Tuesday, September 10, 2019: A Place Where We Belong: Improving Conditions for Learning
When educators develop positive conditions for learning that provide welcoming, supportive and culturally-responsive school environments, they motivate students and their families to come to school, even when there are hurdles to getting there.
The fourth Attendance Awareness webinar of the year will highlight the September Brief, Using Chronic Absence Data to Improve Conditions for Learning, from Attendance Works and the American Institutes for Research (AIR). Join our speakers who will discuss:
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Thursday, August 8, 2019: Open Doors: Create a Healthy School Climate
Imagine a place where you can’t wait to go every day — where you feel safe, connected, supported and excited about learning. What does it take for schools in your community to be like this?
In the third webinar of the 2019 Attendance Awareness Campaign, our speakers share school-wide strategies to create an engaging, healthy school climate that supports everyone in the school building. Whether it’s in an elementary or secondary setting, when school staff work together to increase students’ and families’ sense of belonging, safety and connection to school, and support their physical and emotional health, they can motivate kids to attend even when life is challenging. Presenters:
Thursday, May 16, 2019: Nurture Dreams: Ensure Students Feel Safe, Supported, Connected and Engaged
Being in class every day is even more critical for learning as students enter middle and high school. Students really do miss out when they miss school. Instruction is fast-paced, lessons build on one another and often involve hands-on projects that can’t be replicated at home. Learning to show up every day is also a skill that can help teens get and keep a job as they enter the workforce.
In the second Attendance Awareness webinar of the year, we focus on attendance strategies for the middle and high school grades where chronic absenteeism often spikes. Learn how our featured speakers cultivate positive relationships with youth, identify and remove barriers to attendance, and move beyond simply taking roll to encouraging students to be present so they have an opportunity to reach for their dreams. Presenters:
Thursday, March 21, 2019: Lay a Foundation: Engage Families to Address Chronic Absence in the Early Years
This webinar kicks off the 2019 Attendance Awareness Campaign. Our theme “We Belong in School” recognizes that students are more likely to attend school if they feel safe, connected, supported and engaged.
The session focuses on students’ very first years in school. In many communities across the country, people are surprised to learn that our youngest students — in preschool, kindergarten and early elementary school — often have the highest levels of chronic absence. Yet research shows that good attendance matters from the very beginning of a child’s formal education. Learn how our featured speakers partner with families to nurture positive transitions from preschool to elementary school, build awareness of the connection between attendance and successful school experiences, and address attendance barriers. Presenters:
Wednesday, September 12, 2018: Team Up for Attendance: Data Matters
This session highlights key findings from the September brief, Data Matters: Using Chronic Absence to Accelerate Action for Student Success, from Attendance Works and the Everyone Graduates Center. The brief features a national and state analysis of how many schools face high levels of chronic absence, reflects upon how those patterns can vary by state, and discusses how to use chronic absence data to anticipate and put in place effective solutions to poor attendance that are tailored to local realities.
An interactive data map developed by The Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution, and chronic absence data charts for 50 states and the District of Columbia, makes it easy for users to compare and contrast chronic absence data at the state and local levels. The report includes recommendations for key partners on how to begin to take action or deepen ongoing efforts to improve attendance so that every student has an equal opportunity to learn.
Webinar speakers share examples of how they use chronic absence data to unpack what are the causes of absenteeism so that schools, districts, and community partners can develop solutions tailored to local challenges and resources. These insights are even more important as states begin to make chronic absence data available in their school report cards. Presenters:
Wednesday, August 15, 2018: Team Up for Attendance: Community Matters
Reducing high levels of chronic absence is not a solo sport, but it can be fixed when schools and communities collaborate with multiple stakeholders such as sports teams, housing authorities, local government and more. Join Attendance Works’ third 2018 Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar and learn how to engage community partners, and how community partners can support local efforts to reduce chronic absence. Hear how health care, early childhood and national service volunteers are helping students and families overcome barriers to getting to school every day possible, even when it isn’t easy. Presenters:
May 8, 2018: Team Up for Attendance: Working Together Matters
Teaming up for attendance is critical to reducing chronic absence! What are the secret ingredients that strong schools use to improve attendance? And how do their districts and community partners support their work? Join us for the second 2018 Attendance Awareness Campaign webinar as we welcome speakers from Antioch, California, Albuquerque, New Mexico and Children’s Aid National Center for Community Schools to share their recipes for success. Presenters:
March 28, 2018: Team Up for Attendance: Leadership Matters
Awareness that excellent attendance is vital for student success has never been greater. Today thirty-six states and the District of Columbia include chronic absence in their new state education accountability systems for the Every Student Succeeds Act. With one out of seven students in the U.S. chronically absent, we need leaders in every state and from every sector to mobilize their communities to action and to Team Up for Attendance!
Join Attendance Works and our 69 Attendance Awareness Campaign partners as we kick off the 2018 Attendance Awareness Campaign. You’ll hear how leaders at the state and district levels are uniquely positioned to energize attendance campaigns that result in improvements in school attendance. Presenters include:
September 12, 2017: Portraits of Change: Aligning School and Community Resources to Reduce Chronic Absence
Join us as we discuss the new brief from Attendance Works and the Everyone Graduates Center. Co-authors Hedy Chang and Robert Balfanz will highlight key findings from their national and state analysis of how many schools face high levels of chronic absence and discuss the implications for state and local action. Presenters will share inspiring examples of how their communities reduced chronic absence, even when it reached high levels in a school, district or particular student population. These insights are even more important as a growing number of states adopt chronic absence into their accountability systems for school improvement. Presenters include:
August 8, 2017: The Secret Formula 1+2+3: Improving Attendance for Our Most Vulnerable Students
Communities across the country are reducing chronic absenteeism by using a comprehensive set of strategies that: 1) prevents absences from occurring, 2) organizes caring and early outreach to families and students before absences add up, and 3) coordinates supports and services for vulnerable students who miss the most school. This third of four Attendance Awareness Month 2017 webinars focuses on providing a warm and engaging start to the school year as well as working across agencies to ensure additional supports for our most vulnerable students, including those who are living in public housing, involved in the foster care system, or exposed to trauma. Presenters include:
May 23, 2017: It Takes Two: Adding Early Intervention Strategies to Address Chronic Absence
Communities across the country are reducing chronic absenteeism by using a comprehensive set of strategies that: 1) prevents absences from occurring, 2) organizes caring and early outreach to families and students before absences add up, and 3) coordinates supports and services for vulnerable students who miss the most school. This second of four Attendance Awareness Month 2017 webinars focuses on early outreach and intervention. Presenters include:
March 28, 2017: Reducing Chronic Absence: It’s a Matter of 1, 2, 3!
What does it really take to reduce chronic absence? Communities across the country are reducing chronic absenteeism by using a comprehensive set of strategies that: 1) prevents absences from occurring, 2) organizes caring and early outreach to families and students before absences add up, and 3) coordinates supports and services for vulnerable students who miss the most school. This webinar focuses on universal attendance improvement strategies for all students. These strategies are the first of three tiers of action needed to reduce chronic absence. Presenters include:
December 7, 2016: Every Student Every Day—No Matter What: Realizing the Power of Chronic Absence Data to Ensure Safe, Supportive Schools
Every public school student — no matter his or her race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, disability, citizenship status, or other perceived difference — is entitled to attend a safe, supportive school that promotes daily attendance and ensures an equal opportunity to learn, grow, and succeed. In order to support state, district, school, and community leaders in delivering on this guarantee—no matter what—this virtual summit will feature leading practitioners, researchers, federal officials, and advocates from across the country who are leveraging chronic absence data to propel systems change that ensures high-quality, whole-child supports for all students.
The summit focuses on state and district implementation of the federal Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and the opportunity to realize the power of chronic absence data to develop systems of support that improve student attendance and other important youth outcomes. This event is sponsored by the US Departments of Education, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Justice, in partnership with Attendance Works, Healthy Schools Campaign, Trust for America’s Health and Everyone Graduates Center at Johns Hopkins University.
November 1, 2016: Attendance Awareness All Year Long: Inspiring and Sustaining Progress
After Attendance Awareness Month is over, how can schools and communities reach out to families and students to encourage good attendance all year long? Join Attendance Works and our special guests as they share how to use attendance data to anticipate and counter dips in daily attendance that routinely occur over the course of the school year, ideas for leveraging the success of Attendance Awareness Month throughout the year, strategies for engaging families and students whose absences are adding up, and free resources for messaging all year long about the importance of attendance. Presenters include:
September 8, 2016: Ensuring an Equal Opportunity to Learn: Leveraging Chronic Absence Data for Strategic Action
In June 2016, the U.S. Office for Civil Rights released its first national count of students who were chronically absent. The data showed a staggering 6.5 million students were chronically absent, which means that they missed so much school that their ability to read well and gain fundamental skills and knowledge for college and career was hampered. In the 500 most heavily impacted districts, over 30% of students were chronically absent. Join us as we release a major national study analyzing the data and more importantly, showing how leaders at the local, state and national levels can take strategic action to monitor and address chronic absence in order to ensure an equal opportunity to learn and succeed. Presenters include:
August 16, 2016: Collective Action: Taking a Cross-Sector Approach
Chronic absence — missing 10% of the school year for any reason — has negative consequences for students. Yet with the combined efforts of parents, schools, communities and agencies, it is a solvable problem. What does it look like when partners from various sectors such as education, health, housing, justice and business pool their resources to help families get their children to school every day? Presenters include:
May 17, 2016: Using Data to Drive Action: Portraits of Chronic Absence
What can we learn from states and communities that are already using their local chronic absence data to raise awareness about the impact of absences on student achievement? Join the partners in the Attendance Awareness Campaign as we focus on how state and local innovators are already using chronic absence analyses to galvanize action to reduce chronic absence. Presenters include:
April 12, 2016: Motivating Good Attendance All Year Long
Our first Attendance Awareness Webinar for 2016 focuses on the latest strategies for leveraging positive messaging to prevent and reduce chronic absence. We will also unveil our 2016 Count Us In! toolkit. We invite new communities to launch Attendance Awareness Month in September as a step towards a year-round Attendance Awareness Campaign. Presenters include:
September 9, 2015: Mapping the Early Attendance Gap
Before we can close achievement gaps and reduce dropout rates, we need to address the attendance gaps that start in kindergarten, and even in preschool. Across the country, absenteeism disproportionately affects the students from low-income families and communities of color and those with disabilities. The early attendance gaps, left unchecked, turn into achievement gaps reflected in weaker skills, lower test scores and, ultimately, lower graduation rates. Many of these early absences are excused because of health concerns, but they still represent lost learning time. Building off a new brief from Attendance Works and the Healthy Schools Campaign, this webinar will explore when and why these gaps develop and how we can use data to target interventions. Presenters include:
August 12, 2015: Finish Strong: Address the Attendance Gap for Teens
May 13, 2015: Start Strong: Address the Attendance Gap in the Early Grades
Did you know that chronic absence affects one in 10 children in kindergarten and first grade nationwide? And that early childhood education can lay a foundation for better attendance in the years ahead? What happens when our very youngest learners miss so many opportunities to learn? Children who are chronically absent in kindergarten and first grade are much less likely to read proficiently by the end of third grade and are more likely to have poor attendance in later grades. Early childhood programs, schools and community partners can give young children a strong start. Our speakers will tell how they are using data, reaching out to families to offer support in overcoming common health challenges and developmental delays, and educating parents about the benefits of engaging programs and instruction in the early grades. Presenters include:
April 15, 2015: Ready, Set, Go! Launching Attendance Awareness Month 2015
We invite you to join us in celebrating Attendance Awareness Month in September! Last fall, 324 communities across the country participated in Attendance Awareness Month, calling attention to the importance of school attendance. The time to start planning is now! This webinar is the first of four. It will provide updated resources for your school or community to use in planning and launching Attendance Awareness Month. Be inspired by the creative ways in which various groups drew attention to attendance and learn from our special guests how they rallied their communities to take action. Presenters include:
September 30, 2014: The Power of Positive Connections: Reducing Chronic Absence Through PEOPLE
We know that students who miss too much school suffer academically at every age and every grade. This September, hundreds of communities across the country are working hard to raise awareness about the harmful impact of chronic absence by celebrating Attendance Awareness Month. In addition to raising awareness, what else can your community do to encourage students and families to get to school every day?
Join us as we introduce the new Attendance Works toolkit, The Power of Positive Connections: Reducing Chronic Absence Through PEOPLE. Use the PEOPLE strategy to learn how you can make students who are experiencing attendance challenges a Priority for Early Outreach this fall. Identify ways to encourage them through Positive Linkages to caring adults, enriching activities and needed supports such as health services so that they are Engaged and excited about coming to school. This webinar will also feature Hedy Chang, Director of Attendance Works, and special guests including:
August 6, 2014: Can You Hear Us Now? Amplifying Key Messages About the Importance of Attendance
When parents and youth understand the link between good attendance and their hopes and dreams for the future, they are motivated to do whatever they can to get to school every day. When they hear that message from friends, mentors, teachers, counselors, pastors, coaches, doctors, business owners, mayors — in short, the entire community speaking with one voice — it can have a tremendous impact on student attendance. Join Hedy Chang, Director of Attendance Works, and a cross-section of speakers as they discuss how to engage youth and parents authentically in building a local culture of attendance, as well as share strategies for how to rally leaders from every walk of life to speak in unison during Attendance Awareness Month. Special guests include:
May 28, 2014: We Need You! Enlisting Allies for Your Attendance Campaign
Have you considered enlisting additional allies in your community’s efforts to improve attendance? While most efforts begin naturally and logically with parents and school leaders, there are a number of other powerful allies who can play key roles starting with giving a big boost to Attendance Awareness Month this Fall.
Join our panelists as they share ideas about how to engage allies such as doctors and other health care providers, mayors and elected officials, social service agencies, national and community service programs, youth development organizations and many others. On the panel will be:
April 8, 2014: Count Us In (Again)! Launching the 2014 Attendance Awareness Campaign
Can we mark you “present”? America’s Promise Alliance, Attendance Works, the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading, Points of Light and United Way Worldwide invite you to join us as we launch the second year of the Attendance Awareness Campaign, which designates September as Attendance Awareness Month. Last fall, more than 250 communities across the country participated in the first-ever nationwide Attendance Awareness Month and helped call attention to the importance of daily school attendance.
This year we are seeking even more communities to join the effort. Hear how communities like Vero Beach, Fla., took positive action on attendance and galvanized a broad coalition of civic leaders, educators, parents and youth. We will also unveil the latest version of the “Count Us In!” toolkit, a resource designed to help you plan your Attendance Awareness Campaign involvement and enlist stakeholders who can collaborate with you. This updated version contains even more resources for making a difference in your community for Attendance Awareness Month 2014.
To view the full list of archived Attendance Works webinars, as well as upcoming sessions, click here.