NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Chronic absenteeism is an issue for every school district, but Buhler USD 313 is putting a focus on reducing that number this year.
"Chronic absenteeism, let's define what that means, it means missing 10% or more of your school days," said Buhler USD 313 Superintendent Cindy Couchman. "If we're in school roughly 170-ish days, that means missing 17 or more days of school, so chronically absent is quite a bit. Pre-COVID, Buhler schools ran around 8%, that's pretty low. Since COVID, the year after COVID, 2021-22, we jumped to 32%. Then that was when we had a lot of people home sick, we understand that. That's a little bit of an anomaly, but the following year was around 22%. We really made a considerate effort last year to get it down, and we're working on it again this year. Last year it was 11.8% for Buhler schools. Our goal is to get that back below 10%. And the state average is almost 20%."
Couchman notes that you usually get better results with better measurement.
"We're tracking it closely," Couchman said. "We're communicating with parents. We think, you know, we even see it, I think I've talked to a lot of employers in our county and across the state, showing up to work and it's become an issue since COVID, and I think it starts by forming habits and expectations that you need to show up. That's what we're trying to communicate to our families and to our students is important that you show up to school. There's a lot of things you can do to combat that. We need to make students feel like they belong, and that's a big one. If you feel like you're gonna be missed, then I think you're more likely to show up."
When it comes to the statistics, there's nothing better than being at school.
"Chronic absenteeism is for any reason, whether you're sick, whether you're at a school activity, you're counted, that's, it counts as an absence," Couchman said. "I know when I taught calculus, it didn't matter if they were gone for an activity or they were sick, they were still gone. I still had to reteach the lesson to them. You know, when you have students that are gone, it makes the community of your classroom, it changes it. When the teacher's gone, it changes the community of the classroom. That is part of it. We obviously don't want students to show up to school if they're sick, because that actually hurts our absenteeism because it then exposes other kids to being sick, but if you are able to come to school, we want you there."
If you have questions about USD 313's efforts to combat chronic absenteeism, email Couchman at [email protected].