Louisiana schools have made some big strides in recent years. Math and reading scores are as high – or higher – than they were before the pandemic.
But there’s another data point that’s been harder to move: Attendance.
Chronic absenteeism shot up across the country during the pandemic. But even when most states saw rates start to decline, Louisiana’s continued to climb.
It peaked two school years ago when nearly a quarter of students were chronically absent, missing on average about three weeks of school, according to the state officials. Even more students were considered truant, meaning they were late or absent, without an excuse, five or more times in a semester.
New data shows the rate finally fell last year — by 2 percentage points — to 22.5%. Before the pandemic, the rate was closer to 18%.
The Louisiana Department of Education (LDOE) formed a task force to identify attendance issues and offer solutions in the summer of 2022. It wrapped up work and published a final report at the end of 2024.
To tackle the issue, LDOE launched a dedicated attendance team in June. Its three members are located across the state, so they can visit schools more easily.
“We’re renorming on the importance of being in the classroom,” Misty Davis, the team’s head, said. “Just getting back in check with where we wanna be, how important attendance is and why it really matters.”
The focus, she said, is on ensuring schools accurately take attendance and try to help families get their kids to school by addressing underlying issues before resorting to court action.
In an interview with WWNO’s and WRKF’s Bob Pavlovich, Davis discussed how the state is tackling chronic absenteeism.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Interview highlights
BOB PAVLOVICH: What do we mean when we say chronically absent, and why is it something schools track?
MISTY DAVIS: Chronic absenteeism refers to students who are enrolled at least 10 days and miss 10% or more days of school. So it’s a metric that we can monitor in real-time. It’s an important metric because it represents missed learning, whether or not the absence is excused or unexcused.
PAVLOVICH: We saw absenteeism surge nationally after the pandemic. The rate started coming down a few years ago, though it’s still significantly higher than it was before officials closed schools. Louisiana, on the other hand, saw less of a spike, but its absenteeism rate climbed for longer, until last school year. What do you make of the state’s trend?
DAVIS: Well, we just know that it was headed in the wrong direction for a little while. You know, the pandemic posed some unique challenges. We came out of that with required quarantining and virtual learning. We’re renorming on the importance of being in the classroom. Just getting back in check with where we wanna be, how important attendance is and why it really matters.
PAVLOVICH: Is last year’s improvement a sign that we’re moving in the right direction again?
DAVIS: We think that it is. We were excited when we saw that data because we started that conversation in the spring semester. It was really when the Nation’s Report Card recognized that our literacy rates looked good, our math rates were heading in the right direction, but there was an asterisk that said this is really in spite of, and probably minimized growth because of the attendance issue. That really got our attention.
PAVLOVICH: Do you know why students are missing more school than they were before the pandemic?
DAVIS: There are multiple reasons. Of course, students miss because of illness. Really, this is something where we’re asking schools and systems that do have attendance issues to have conversations with parents and families, to not just assume what the reasons are, but to actually learn what the reasons are. Some common ones besides illness are transportation, family dynamics, and, of course, some students are homeless or migrants. The good news is that there are research-based interventions and supports that we can put into place to help students overcome those barriers once we identify them.
PAVLOVICH: What are some strategies schools are trying that appear to be working?
DAVIS: Many of our systems across the state made back-to-school announcements saying, “We want you here every day because it matters.” That’s a proactive thing. Early intervention strategies include one-on-one conversations where we identify specific barriers with targeted solutions. Home visits are appropriate in some situations with support from other government agencies.
PAVLOVICH: What about the courts? What role do they play in getting kids to go to school, and at what point do they get involved?
DAVIS: Our solutions summit was hosted by the state Supreme Court earlier this month. It was a great opportunity for court representatives to explain their role to educators. The first layer of that is an informal process that’s designed to help keep families and students out of court, but it is still a legal process.
PAVLOVICH: Nearly 400 educators, judges and other stakeholders attended the summit. How did it go?
DAVIS: We had a really great day. We started with some context, the problem and the definitions of terms to make sure we’re all speaking the same language. Then they sat collaboratively in jurisdictional groups. As people were talking, they really were thinking about solutions: “How do we meet the needs of families and students to help them get back into school?” That was really exciting to hear conversations from parishes and jurisdictions all over the state.
