District Attendance Coordinator: Eugene Li (eli2@schools.nyc.gov)
Each title below includes links with resources that help school leaders make plans to improve student attendance and reduce chronic absenteeism.
Summer staff can play an important role in proactively preventing absences in the next school year.
Draft the school attendance policy (see Planning Tools and Templates Section below)
Use this grid as a resource to brainstorm tiered interventions for students.
Speak with families about what chronic absenteeism is and the benefits of regular attendance during summer orientations or community events.
Proactively make phone calls to students and families that were chronically absent last school year to identify reasons for absence and provide resources. (Scripts for Engaging with Families About Absenteeism)
Send letters home reminding families when the first day of school is and share how excited you are to welcome them back to the school community.
Starting Strong: Action Planning Worksheet This tool is designed to help identify and prioritize strategic actions to decrease chronic absenteeism.
NYCDOE Attendance Policy template This template was developed to help schools develop a public facing attendance policy document to share with all stakeholders (families, staff and the school community).
School Attendance Plan Template This template is designed to help schools develop an attendance plan. It includes questions and prompts to help schools set goals, analyze root causes for chronic absenteeism, and map out tiered supports for chronically absent students and plan ahead to celebrate and recognize students for good and improved attendance.
How to Set Attendance Policies A guide to writing school attendance policies and a template/sample set of policies.
NYCDOE Standard Attend Policies The standard attendance policies from the family-facing schools.nyc.gov page
How To Complete the Attendance Plan of the OSYD Consolidated Plan and Template The OSYD Consolidated Plan is to be submitted to DOE central and is always due at the end of September every year. The purpose of the Consolidated Attendance Plan is to ensure that the school’s plan for attendance is in alignment with the relevant Chancellor’s regulations. Of note, the Consolidated Attendance Plan is not the same plan as the school’s Attendance Policy and Plan.
Attendance Activities School Year Plan Activities in the grid are examples. You can customize the plan for your school or program. For each activity, specify who is responsible for leading and how to measure the results. You can also recreate this chart in a larger format and use post-it notes to add activities as a group exercise. See the 3 Tiers of Intervention
Attendance Playbook A comprehensive compendium of strategies to address absenteeism.
InfoHub: Attendance Team Meeting Links NYCDOE Webpage with links and resources to support attendance teams.
Attendance Team Effective Practices.pdf Key tips and strategies to help school attendance teams to analyze attendance data, discuss reasons students miss school, and develop and drive plans for attendance improvement.
Attendance Team Overview (AttendanceWorks.org) This document has been developed as a training guide for principals interested in establishing a school-based student attendance team as a vehicle to improve attendance and reduce chronic absence for all students. Includes sample agenda.
Weekly Attendance Team Meeting Overview NYC Community Schools overview of attendance teams with Sample Attendance Team Meeting Video.
Handbook for attendance teams This handbook includes guidance, action plans and sample agendas for schools taking an Inquiry Team approach to addressing attendance.
How to use the NV Data Portal in your attendance meetings Sample agenda for weekly attendance team meeting using the New Visions Data Portal. The Portal centralizes critical information and organizes views so educators can identify students who need attendance or academic support. Attendance dashboards are updated daily based on STARS and ATS to provide an accurate picture of attendance patterns within the school.
Attendance Team Meeting Agenda Sample agenda for weekly attendance team meeting using Insight to monitor school-wide and individual student attendance patterns.
Attendance Team Meeting Agenda (using ATS) Sample agenda for weekly attendance team meeting using ATS to monitor school-wide and individual student attendance patterns.
Every Student, Every Day Strategy Resources
Every Student, Every Day attendance improvement strategy implementation steps to reduce chronic absenteeism
Define and communicate clear attendance processes and practices
Activate a weekly attendance team meeting to monitor trends in attendance and chronic absenteeism, and assign student interventions
Personalize student interventions to encourage regular attendance
Partner with communities to build a supportive learning environment
NYC DOE Every Student, Every Day (ESED) Web page Guidance for implementing the NYC DOE attendance improvement strategy. Printable Guide (PDF)
NYC Community Schools Every Student, Every Day website Resources for implementing the Every Student Every Day (ESED) Strategy
How to Incorporate Attendance Practices in School Instructional Expectations This includes a sample agenda for a staff meeting about attendance, ideas for exploring attendance in the classroom across the curriculum, and a Danielson Framework crosswalk that demonstrates how teachers can take action to encourage good attendance, prevent absences, and provide continuity of instruction when students do miss school.
Building a Culture of Good Attendance: Five Ideas for Monday PD
Integrates data from ATS and STARS, including demographics, attendance, and student performance. Information is updated every night, to provide an accurate picture of attendance and achievement patterns within the school. The Portal facilitates progress monitoring of students assigned to a point person or advisor or other groupings.
DOE web-based tool that gives users the ability to:
Compare attendance and chronic absenteeism rates among different subgroups.
View school-wide trends broken down by student subgroups to fully analyze the data.
Identify students in need of additional support based on their school attendance.
The Datahub attendance dashboard provides the following attendance data:
Daily and year to date attendance by school, district, citywide, or in subgroups.
Comparison of current year-to-date attendance with previous year-to-date attendance .
Chronic absenteeism by school, district, citywide, or in subgroups.
How to Start a Success Mentor Program 1-Pager
Connecting Thru Conversation Short Activities
Creating a Success Mentoring Program Office of Community Schools
How to be a Great Mentor Mentor NY