Fourteen states from different regions of the country are early adopters of our challenge to reduce chronic absence by 50% in five years.

This amounts to actions that can support about 9.6 million students — or 20% of the country’s public school students. We’re excited about this visible demonstration of how seriously education leaders across the country are taking the problem.

Denise Forte with EdTrust and Nat Malkus with AEI joined us to announce this bold and achievable national chronic absence challenge. We jointly wrote an op-ed recently published in The Hill. Below are excerpts:

Since the pandemic, schools have become political battlegrounds, where seemingly every issue is polarized: school closures, mask mandates, teachings about race and sexuality, school choice, the content available in school libraries and even reading and math instruction.

Indeed, two of us testified to our differences on some of these topics in the same congressional hearing. But chronic absence stands apart from these contentious issues. Not only is it not polarized, it is the most important issue facing schools today.

Despite our differences on other education issues, we three agree that all states and school districts must make this the top priority for this school year, by adopting an ambitious goal: cut chronic absence by 50 percent over five years.
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We need a plan, now, because the real systemic threat is that these elevated post-pandemic rates of absenteeism will become a new normal, with dire consequences both for students and society.

Read the full joint op-ed in The Hill.