Olathe Public Schools is seeing a rise in chronic absenteeism among students, school district officials and staff warn.
“We know one of the things that leads to success is kids being in school,” Superintendent Brent Yeager said in early September at a school board meeting when discussing the issue.
On Monday, the topic was the primary focus of the Olathe school district’s fall Site Council meeting. Hundreds of parents and guardians from site councils from across the school system gathered for the meeting at Olathe South High School.
After a presentation about chronic absenteeism, the attendees then divided up into breakout discussions related to the topic but with specific focuses on age groups, barriers to attendance and potential community solutions.
What is chronic absenteeism?
- A student is considered chronically absent from school when they miss 10% of the school year or more for any purpose that isn’t school-sponsored, said Scott Fluke, assistant director of Behavior and Social Emotional Learning and Mental Health Services for Olathe schools.
- For the 2024-25 school year — which has been in session for just over 30 days — a student would be considered chronically absent if they’ve missed about four days so far.
- More broadly, if a student misses just two days of school a month, that would add up to missing 10% of the school year.
- That’s equivalent to one whole month of school missed if compounded across a whole school year, or nearly a full year of school missed if it continues throughout a student’s whole K-12 education.
- Fluke said students can be chronically absent for any number of reasons, but it can include long-term health conditions, a lack of consistent transportation or even trouble connecting at school.
3,300+ Olathe students are chronically absent
Fluke said that as of last Friday, 3,303 students in Olathe are considered chronically absent this school year.
With roughly 28,500 students in the district, that would mean nearly 12% of the student population is considered chronically absent this school year so far. That number doesn’t consider students who were chronically absent last year.
Fluke also pointed out that the issue is the most pronounced among the youngest and oldest students. The district is seeing the highest rates of absenteeism among its juniors and seniors, followed by its kindergarteners and first-graders.
Yeager, in September, said that the Olathe school district’s chronic absenteeism rate has started “outpacing” the state average “not in a good way.” He wasn’t specific about the numbers, but he said Olathe has seen more of its students considered chronically absent than statewide percentages.
“This is one area where we are struggling compared to the state average, and obviously that’s important to us for a lot of reasons,” he said, noting that unchecked, the issue poses a risk to the district’s accreditation.
However, this is a growing issue outside of Olathe schools too. Fluke said chronic absenteeism is “one of the primary challenges in modern education,” and it’s only gotten worse post-pandemic.
Olathe school district is looking for solutions
Olathe Public Schools leadership wants to see the chronic absenteeism rate in the district drop back to its pre-pandemic level, if not even lower than that.
How the district plans to get there is still a little bit uncertain, but it’s looking to the community for solutions.
“What we need now is action that we can collectively do,” Fluke said. “This issue, it is something that is, by definition, bigger than any one of us can do alone.”
In the meantime, Yeager has stressed that school district staff and administration have been emphasizing communication with families about “the importance of kids being in school every day.”
For example, there may be more emails going out to families this year reminding them about attendance at the building level, and the district communications team is also working on a messaging program.
“At the end of the day, if they’re not in our seats, they’re going to struggle, so we want every student there every moment that we can have them there,” said Julie Veatch, director of school improvement and assessments, during the September school board meeting.
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