What will make children go to school? The answer to that question used to be obvious. First, their parents. And then, if not, the law. But over the past few years, particularly since the pandemic and resulting lockdowns, some kids got out of the habit of going to school. And they are still not back.
Take Maine, for instance, where chronic absenteeism (defined by missing more than 10% of school days) has become a serious problem. According to a recent article in the Portland Press Herald, “Before the pandemic, 16.8% of Maine’s K – 12 students met this definition. During the pandemic by the 2021-22 school year, that number almost doubled to 31.5%. Last year, it dropped slightly to 27.3%.”
Those numbers are reflective of the national ones. As my colleague Nat Malkus has noted, nationwide chronic absenteeism rates were at “29% in 2021–22 and 27% in the 39 states that have released data for 2022–23 (up from 15% in 2018–19).”
A recent article in New York magazine notes how common it has become recently for kids (of various economic strata) to take “mental health days.” For some, these have turned into longer term “school avoidance.” The author notes that allowing too many mental health days signals to kids that you think they can’t handle whatever is going wrong at school. Instead of indulging children, it would be better to signify that we actually think school is important and they need to face their problems.