Dear Parent/Guardian,
I hope this finds you well and hope you and your child’s school experience to date has been positive and rewarding. I see many bright smiles and happy students daily!
We are in the 10th week of school! Term 1 for middle and high schoolers closes today. It is hard to fathom we have completed ¼ of the school year, which brings me to the topic for which I write to you, Attendance Matters. Good attendance predicts success for students. Good attendance requires students to also attend school on time; a late start to the day is a setback and can cause undue stress to your child.
Naturally a child should be kept home if they are ill. A parent/guardian may question what constitutes whether a child be kept at home. Please see helpful guidance from Nurse Leader, Mrs. Rene Paine, Letter from Nurse Leader.
We in the district are focused on good attendance this year as every year. We do have grave concerns on our students who are frequently absent. We worry first on their health, and we also worry they are not attending school because they do not feel connected or happy at school. Why is that? Why does a child not feel connected or dislikes school? We want to know if your child feels this way so we can intervene and work with your child to feel connected and happy while at school. We are here to support families, and we strongly encourage our families to reach out to us. Please see guidance here from School Counselor & Curriculum Leader, Ms. Cynthia Esielionis, which outlines the support and resources available to you.
Additionally, please refer to these handy tips and resources for parents provided by attendanceworks.org.
The Massachusetts Department of Education (DESE) tracks chronic absenteeism in all districts; it is one of the indicators on the MCAS. Chronic absenteeism is when a student in Grades 1 through 12 misses 10% or more of his/her membership in any school year and this includes excused and unexcused absences. For example, our school year is 181 days and a student who misses 18 or more days is identified as being chronically absent.
What is important to us is why a student misses 10% or more of his/her school year. We understand that some students have a chronic illness. We are concerned about the students who just are not coming to school.
Please take a few minutes to reflect on the following:
Has my child(ren) attended school every day this year?
The day(s) my child was absent was due to an illness.
My child was absent on a particular day because he/she did not want to go to school.
My child refuses to attend school.
If upon reflection, you answer yes to statements 3 and/or 4, please contact your child’s counselor as soon as possible so we can partner with you get to the root cause.
We have set a goal that all students will achieve an attendance rate of 95% or higher this school year. Let’s work together to reach this goal. We can do it! Each week in the Weekly Update beginning the week of November 11, we will report our attendance rate for the prior week at each school.
We are most pleased to report attendance rates to date, Friday, November 1, 2019.
HS - 96.90%
MS - 96.35%
PH - 97.19%
LAW - 98.59%
These are excellent rates and please work with us to continue good attendance all year.
Remember the school day starts the night before with a good night’s sleep. Attendance matters and we want your child in school every day learning away.
Most sincerely,
Dr. Malone
Superintendent
