A University of Iowa education professor who studies why students skip school says she’s encouraged by a new report on a hefty drop in absenteeism in Iowa’s schools, though she says there’s still more work to do. Kari Vogelgesang, director of professional development at the university’s Scanlan Center for School Mental Health, says students tend to miss school because they feel overwhelmed, not just apathetic, and the reasons often fall into one of two categories.
The other main reason students are absent is some sort of “pull” factor.
The report out last week from the Department of Education shows chronic absenteeism dropped by about five-percent statewide in the two years since a state law addressing the issue took effect. In the several years prior to the pandemic, she says Iowa’s absentee rate was holding at around 11-percent.
We’re now returning to more of a baseline for chronic absenteeism, which she defines as missing class about 10-percent of the time. School administrators and legislators can do more, Vogelgesang says, to help bring those numbers down even further.
Vogelgesang studies the drivers of chronic absenteeism and is a founding member of Attendance USA, a national initiative focused on addressing student attendance and engagement. The state report says Iowa’s five-percent drop in absenteeism is one of the largest reported decreases in the country.
