
Spring
- If you’re working with a coalition, plan a meeting and agree on activities. See resources for educators and community partners, as well as sample year-long planning calendars.
- Recruit partners to support the work. See Who Can Help.
- Launch a student poster contest or video contest, with winning entries to be displayed during September. See the Count Us In! toolkit for more information.
- Enlist health care providers to share information on attendance during back-to-school checkups. See our tools for health providers.
- If you’re planning to look at data, approach appropriate school or district officials about the availability of attendance information.
- Identify one or two local schools that are bright spots. These schools serve low-income students, but have better-than-average attendance can inspire others to act. Learn how to identify positive outliers.
Early Summer
- Enlist elected officials to sign proclamations. See template proclamations for elected officials, superintendents, school boards and community organizations.
- Recruit local sports stars and celebrities for school visits/and assemblies
- Recruit local faith leaders to speak to congregations about attendance
- Distribute talking points to key partners. See our key messages.
- Line up incentives from businesses and other partners for contests. See our tips for incentives.
- If you’re planning to look at data, crunch the numbers for chronic absence. See our free data tools.
- If you have the data, build a data dashboard with weekly reports to principal.
Late Summer
- Tape radio or TV Public Service Announcements. See our guidelines for developing TV and Radio PSAs
- Begin media outreach. See our tips for media outreach.
Meet with local newspaper editorial boards to encourage editorials
Submit a commentary piece to local media in mid- to late August
Pitch a reporter about the community’s or school district’s renewed emphasis on attendance
- Print banners and posters. See our promotion materials.
- Plan an attendance display. See our promotion materials.
- Plan student assemblies and parent summits. See the resources in the Count Us In! toolkit for more.
- Launch a door-knocking campaign to remind families when school starts. See our tips for early outreach.
- Share the Teaching Attendance 2.0 toolkit with teachers during professional development sessions before school starts
- If schools open in August, hold first-day-of-school events stressing the importance of attendance
September
- Release proclamations
- If schools open in September, hold first-day-of-school events stressing the importance of attendance
- Hold an end-of-the-month summit, rewarding students with good or improved attendance
- Launch an attendance contest among schools and classes
- Host a press conference talking about the community’s or school district’s emphasis on attendance
- Pitch reporters to attend assemblies or report on celebrity visits
- Unveil an attendance display
- If you’ve crunched chronic absence numbers, share with the school board, city officials and, if appropriate, the public
- Share tweets (#SchoolEveryDay) and Facebook posts about the Attendance Awareness Campaign.