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The Board of Education believes that regular student attendance is a necessary and vital ingredient in the learning process. Therefore, the Board, in accordance with the state Education Law, requires that each minor regularly attend school full-time from the first day of session in September of the school year in which the minor becomes six years of age through the last day of the school year in which such minor becomes sixteen years of age, unless he/she had completed a four-year high school course of study. He/she may attend a school other than a public school or receive home instruction, provided the instruction is equivalent to that given in the public schools.
Through implementation of this policy the Board expects:
1. To encourage full attendance by all students;
2. To accurately track the attendance, absence, tardiness and early departure of students to and from the school;
3. To ensure sufficient pupil attendance of classes so that pupils may achieve State mandated education standards;
4. To track student location for safety reasons and to account to parents regarding the location of children during school hours.
The Board shall designate a person as the Attendance Officer. The Attendance Officer shall be responsible for maintaining the register of attendance. The Attendance Officer is responsible for reviewing pupil attendance records and initialing appropriate action to address unexcused pupil absence, tardiness and early departure consistent with the Comprehensive Attendance Policy.
Every school is required to take attendance and record each pupil’s presence, absence, tardiness or early departure, and whether such is excused or unexcused in the following manner:
1. In non-departmentalized grades, attendance must be taken once a day;
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2. If students are released from school grounds for lunch, attendance must be
taken again after lunch.
3. In all other cases attendance must be taken each period. Where a class extends for multiple periods, attendance for that class only must be taken once.
4. Additionally, after attendance is taken, an individual student’s late arrival or early departure must be recorded.
Whenever used within the Comprehensive Attendance Policy, the following terms shall mean:
1. Scheduled Instruction: Every period that a pupil is scheduled to attend instructional or supervised study activities during the course of a school day during the school year or during mandatory summer school classes.
2. Absent: The pupil is not present for the entire period of the pupil’s scheduled instruction.
3. Tardy: The pupil arrives later than the starting time of the pupil’s scheduled instruction.
4. Early Departure: The pupil leaves prior to the end of the pupil’s scheduled instruction.
5. Excused: Any absence, tardiness, or early departure for which the pupil has a valid school approved excuse. Such excused non-appearance shall include: personal illness, illness or death in the family, religious observance, quarantine, required court appearances, attendance at health clinics or other medical visits, approved college visits, military obligations, absences approved in advance by the Principal, and other reasons as may be approved by the Commissioner of Education.
6. Unexcused: Any absence, tardiness or early departure for which the pupil has no valid school approved excuse. Such unexcused non-appearance shall include shopping trips, family vacation, oversleeping, skipping class, and any other absence that is not excused.
7. ATED: Absences, tardiness, and early dismissals.
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The following coding system shall be used to indicate the nature and reason for a pupil’s missing all or part of scheduled instruction:
E = excused U = unexcused
A = absent R = return
D = early departure F = family
SE = external suspension S = sick
SI = internal suspension O = illegal
FT = field trip M = medical
P = personal TU = tardy unexcused
A-BO = absence BOCES TE = tardy excused
The time that the pupil arrived or departed will be recorded next to the entry code describing the nature and reason for the student missing all or part of scheduled instruction.
For example, if a student left at 11:30 a.m. for a doctor’s appointment, the code would read: E/DM: 11:30 a.m.
In order to encourage student attendance, the following strategies and incentives shall apply:
1. Minimum Attendance for Course Credit
a. In grades 7 – 12, any student with more than ten (10) unexcused ATED’s in a semester course or twenty (20) unexcused ATED’s in a yearlong course will not receive credit for the course. Any excused absence, for which the student has completed assigned make-up work, will not be counted as an absence for the purposes of determining whether the student has attended sufficient classes to receive course credit under this provision.
i. For purposes of minimum attendance requirements, a student shall not be counted as present for a class if the student misses more than 20 minutes of classes, whether through tardiness or early departure.
ii. Students of compulsory attendance age suspended from school instruction may not be marked as absent unless they fail to attend scheduled alternative education on that day.
iii. Students over the compulsory attendance age suspended from school instruction will be marked absent unless they have been assigned alternative education. If alternative education has been assigned, only failure to attend scheduled alternative education shall count as an absence.
b. In order to prevent loss of credit for failure to attend, the district will take the following steps.
i. For every five unexcused absences, tardies, early departures, or any combination thereof, the pupil’s parent(s) or persons in parental relation shall receive a notice containing the dates, times, and the nature of the pupil’s unexcused nonpresence.
ii. After being absent for fifteen (15) class periods in a year-long course or seven (7) class periods in a semester course the district shall notify the student and his parent(s) or persons in parental relation that the student is approaching the limit of absences for losing course credit for failure to attend class. The notice will include the school’s attendance for credit policy, the actual number of classes the student may miss before forfeiting the right to earn credit, and the actual number of classes missed today:
iii. A student and his parent(s) or persons in parental relation will be advised one month before the completion of the course if the student is in jeopardy of losing credit for failure to attend. The notice will include the school’s attendance for credit policy, the actual number of classes the student may miss before forfeiting the right to earn credit, and the actual number of classes missed to date.
iiv. Teachers will provide makeup work upon request so that students who are in jeopardy of forfeiting class credits due to excused absences have the opportunity to earn credit for the course.
v. Where a student is in jeopardy of losing credit for excessive absences, the Building Principal shall be responsible for reviewing attendance records, determining eligibility for makeup work for excused absences, and arranging student makeup opportunities with teachers, including deadlines.
2. Notice of Absences
The pupil’s parent(s) or person in parental relation shall be notified of a pupil’s absences, tardiness or early departure according to the following:
a. Where a pupil has not been marked as present for the first period of scheduled instruction and the school has not been previously notified of the absence, the district shall attempt to contact the pupil’s parent(s) or person in parental relation to learn the nature of the pupil’s absence and notify the parent that the pupil has not arrived at school.
b. When a student is absent, tardy, or leaves early from class or school without excuse, the district shall attempt to contact the pupil’s parents or person in parental relation of the specific ATED, remind them of the attendance policy, and review ATED intervention procedures with them.
3. Disciplinary Procedures
The pupil may be subject to disciplinary procedures for unexcused absence, tardiness, or early departure, including verbal and written warnings, detentions, in-school suspension, and loss of extra-curricular privileges, as described in the Code of Conduct.
4. Incentives
The district will design and implement systems to acknowledge a student’s efforts to maintain or improve school attendance. For example:
· An attendance, honor roll and awards assembly followed by refreshments for the qualifying students for each quarter.
· At classroom levels, teachers are encouraged to assign special responsibilities (lead groups and assist teacher, etc.) to students who may need extra motivation to come to school.
· Give out certificates for perfect attendance at the end of the school year.
5. Intervention Strategy Development
The Building Principal shall meet each marking period with the Attendance Officer and other administrators and teachers as the Principal determines necessary to review student attendance records, address identified patterns of unexcused pupil absence, tardiness and early departure, and review current intervention methods. Where the Principal determines that existing intervention policies or practices are insufficient, the Principal shall notify the Board of Education prior to its annual review of the building’s attendance records, of both insufficient practices and any proposed changes needing Board approval to implement.
To be successful in this endeavor, it is imperative that all members of the school community are aware of this policy, its purpose, procedures and the consequences of non-compliance. To ensure that students, parents, teachers and administrators are notified of and understand this policy, the following procedures shall be implemented.
· The attendance policy will be included in student handbooks and will be reviewed with students at the start of the school year.
· School newsletters and publications will include periodic reminders of the components of this policy.
· The district will provide a copy of the attendance policy and any amendments thereto the faculty and staff. New staff will receive a copy upon their employment.
All faculty and staff will meet at the beginning of each school year to review the attendance policy to clarify individual roles in its implementation.
· Copies of this policy will also be made available to any community member, upon request.
Annual Review
The Board shall annually review student attendance records and, if such records show a decline in student attendance, the Board shall revise this comprehensive attendance policy and make any revisions to the plan it deems necessary to improve student attendance.
Cross Ref: 1741 Home Instruction
4327 Homebound Instruction
4331 Summer School
4710 Grading Systems
4760 Make-Up Opportunities
5130 Compulsory Attendance Ages
5182 Released Time for Religious Instruction
5300 Code of Conduct
Ref: Education Law §§1709; 3024; 3025; 3203; 3205-3213; 3225
8 NYCCR §§ 104.1; 175.6
Adopted: February 12, 1997
Revised: May 8, 2002 (effective July 1, 2002)