The COVID-19 pandemic deeply impacted schools across the nation. A new report shows that chronic absenteeism has still not recovered from pre-pandemic levels.
The Education Recovery Scorecard is a study put together by Harvard and Stanford researchers to look at how schools have improved since the days of home classroom learning during COVID-19. Across the board, schools still struggle, though some have made great strides.
In Texas, chronic absenteeism is reaching critical levels. The study defines chronic absenteeism as missing 10 percent or more of the school year. In Texas in 2019, the rate was 11 percent among the public school population. In 2023, it has almost doubled to 21 percent. That number is actually a small improvement from 2022 when the rate was 26 percent, more than one in four students.
There are several reasons chronic absenteeism has risen. Many parents became more cautious about sending their children to school with suspected health issues following a pandemic that killed 1.2 million Americans. Other children face barriers returning to school such as the loss of special needs resources or bus routes as school struggle with underfunding.
Chronic absenteeism has a cascade effect on school outcomes. A 2018 report from the National Center on Educational Outcomes showed that a student who is chronically absent for just one year is seven times more likely to drop out.
The continued high levels of chronic absenteeism likely also explain other findings in the Education Recovery Scorecard. Texas students have also not returned to proficiency when it comes to math and reading scores. Across the state, math proficiency is half a grade level lower than it was in 2019, and reading is a third of a grade level lower.
Some schools have recovered. Klein and Conroe ISD have both returned to pre-pandemic levels, and Frisco ISD has actually surpassed its 2019 scores. Houston ISD, the state’s largest district and currently under a state takeover, saw extremely modest gains in math since 2022 while having modest losses in reading in the same time frame. This trend is likely to continue considering Houston ISD is significantly reducing the number of library services.
Across the nation, Texas ranks 31st in math recovery, while achieving a more respectable 8th place in reading recovery.
Chronic absenteeism could become an even larger problem under the Donald Trump Administration. The president has vowed to close the Department of Education, which provides Title I funding for schools that pay to mitigate the exact same problems marginalized students face that cause absenteeism in the first place. The Education Recovery Report suggests that robust federal funding is instrumental in reducing chronic absenteeism.
“Even without federal relief dollars, states could be targeting continuing federal Title I dollars and state dollars to implement interventions which have been shown effective, such as tutoring and summer learning,” it reads. “State leaders, mayors, employers and other community leaders should join schools to redouble efforts on the shared challenge of reducing student absenteeism.”
