The number of students constantly absent from public K-12 campuses worsened during the 2024–25 school year, the Rand Corp. said Thursday.
The California nonprofit think tank estimated that 10.8 million K-12 students, or 22% nationally, were “chronically absent,” which the federal government defines as missing at least 10% of the school year.
That’s up from 9.4 million, or 19%, who hit that mark — 18 out of 180 school days in many districts — during 2023-24.
The six researchers who authored the report cited pandemic-era policy changes, such as relaxed makeup policies and online learning exemptions, for shifting “at least some parents’ perceptions about the importance of their children being physically present in school.”
They also noted that increased student anxiety and depression, and an increase in parents “taking illnesses more seriously after the pandemic and keeping their children home for minor issues instead of sending them to school,” likely contributed to school districts naming “sickness” as the top issue keeping students home last year.
The report also found that chronic absenteeism in 2024-25 afflicted 30% of students in urban school districts. They were five to six times more likely to report this “extreme chronic absenteeism” than rural or suburban districts.
By comparison, Rand estimated that just 15% of all K-12 students were chronically absent before the pandemic. That rate ballooned to a high of 28% in 2021-22 as most schools enacted hybrid learning policies.
Rand conducted a representative public survey of 245 public school districts between March and May, out of roughly 13,000 districts nationwide.
According to some experts not involved in the survey, it’s unlikely that students are missing school more often because more of them are sick than in past decades.
“A more likely explanation is that norms and habits have changed,” said David Griffith, a researcher at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, a conservative education think tank.
“Obviously, the pandemic was scary,” added Mr. Griffith, a former high school social studies teacher. “But moving forward, parents need to be a little tougher and insist that kids go to school unless they are clearly ill. The research shows that chronic absenteeism is bad for kids.”
As part of the study published Thursday, Rand researchers also interviewed 14 school district leaders. They included two from urban areas who said the same problems afflicting rural and suburban students were hitting them with greater force.
“They cited an increase in student and family disengagement, student illnesses and mental health challenges, and transportation issues, but they emphasized that the challenges they face in urban districts ‘are just that much more acute and concentrated,’” the study noted.
In a separate panel of 1,551 youths ages 12 to 21 whom Rand surveyed in January and February, 74% said missing three weeks of school would be a problem and hard to make up.
The remaining 26% said it would be “mostly OK” to miss that much class, with the children of parents with only a high school diploma likelier than those in more educated families to minimize it.
Decades of studies have linked chronic absenteeism, which is more common in low-income families, to poorer academic and life outcomes.
Stewart D. Roberson, a former public middle and high school principal in Fredericksburg, Virginia, said it’s essential to get kids back to pre-pandemic attendance numbers.
He noted that “satisfactory attendance” has long meant missing 5% or less of the school year for a reason.
“Children must be engaged in teaching and learning for individual success,” said Mr. Roberson, an education professor at the University of Virginia. “Districts must create the conditions with parents to achieve satisfactory levels of attendance to remain accountable to the public.”
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• Sean Salai can be reached at ssalai@washingtontimes.com.