Drawinq dropouts out of the shadows: a standards-based curriculum has not been enough to ensure the education of the staggering number of students who disappear from the educational system.

Every year a staggering number of students disappear from the educational system. Drawing these students out of the shadows with accurate data and effective interventions is the first step to keeping them in school through to their graduation.

Tracking the 30 percent of students who drop out

Most educators are using test data and standards-based curriculum and instruction to close the achievement gap. Disappointingly, standards-based curriculum and instruction has not been enough to ensure the education of 30 percent of our youth with persistent school attendance problems.

Recent reports from the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, the Educational Testing Service, the Harvard Civil Rights Project and Education Trust have estimated that about a third of our students have such severe school attendance problems that they end up leaving school entirely before graduation. The National Center for Educational Statistics has released its estimate of California's graduation rate for 2002-03 at 74.1 percent, slightly above the dismal U.S. average of 73.9 percent.

For the sake of California's significant population of dropouts, it is essential that schools be conscientious about tracking student attendance and using this data for early intervention. School districts that have not already submitted their Annual Statewide Student Identifier Enrollment update to the California School Information Services should do so as soon as possible, since this year's enrollment update establishes the baseline for accurate dropout and graduation rates.

Efforts to ensure students receive the assistance they need to stay in school are the only remedy for them to regain access to the standards and learning. Success in achieving standards with students who attend regularly doesn't compensate for those who disappear from the school before earning a diploma.

State laws and the process for intervention

The problem of students accumulating absences until they stop attending school entirely is not new. In the mid-1970s, California's Legislature was alerted to the dangerously high percentage of dropouts and enacted legislation to require local boards of education to appoint a "supervisor of attendance and such assistant supervisors of attendance as may be necessary to supervise the attendance of pupils in the district or county" (Education Code Section 48240).

The law went further and mandated that school boards would prescribe the "duties" of the supervisor of attendance to include specific responsibilities and methods for how to keep these low-attending students in school. Legislation also created School Attendance Review Boards. SARB panels of school and community experts were designed to meet with persistently absent students or students with persistent behavior problems and their families. The charge was to develop individual solutions for students using school and community resources.

Despite California's staggering number of dropouts, many school districts have yet to begin an effective SARB program. Thirty percent of our children continue to disappear into the shadows.

In State Superintendent Jack O'Connell's February 2005 Highlights communication to superintendents, he reminded counties and districts of the urgent responsibility to keep track of these students, saying, "Just as decisions about instruction must be driven by data, so must decisions about dropout interventions."

By collecting accurate information on the number of SARB referrals and interventions pursuant to Education Code Section 48273, counties such as San Diego and San Bernardino have the data they need to develop strategies for meeting the special needs of students who are at risk of dropping out.

Also, as more and more districts in each county submit their enrollment updates to CSIS, dropout prevention programs will be able to track individual students from grade to grade and school to school.

To monitor district progress in submitting enrollment updates in your county, go to www.csis.k12.ca.us/library/ statewide--identifier/default.asp.

Why implement attendance intervention?

As promising as these state truancy laws are, over the years since the 1970s dropout alarm sounded, many school districts and county offices of education have been overwhelmed with other pressing demands. Most researchers have attributed the lack of focus on school attendance to the scarcity of accurate data on dropouts, the overriding emphasis on improving standards-based instruction, or severely strained school budgets.

However, the emphasis in school accountability may shift from a singular focus on mastering grade-level standards. Educational researchers have suggested that when Congress reauthorizes No Child Left Behind, it must also set meaningful goals for keeping students in school until graduation.

Measuring school success must also be based on accurate dropout data and graduation data from middle schools and high schools. An expert panel appointed by the U.S. Department of Education researched the current graduation rate method used by the National Center for Education Statistics. As a result of its examination, the panel recommended that a more accurate method for calculating graduation rates be developed.

In California, the CSIS data collection has the potential of calculating the accurate graduation and dropout rates needed for dropout prevention programs.

Starting a results-based attendance supervision program

Accurate early identification of truancy problems and effective intervention starts with an effective school board policy on attendance supervision. The State School Attendance Review Board, an advisory group appointed by State Superintendent O'Connell, has recommended that county and district school boards consider adopting a policy and administrative regulations consistent with requirements already in law. A sample policy with administrative regulations for attendance supervision is available at www.cde.ca.gov/45463.

Such a policy reflects the legislative intent in Education Code Section 48340 that early identification and intervention in school attendance is imperative for a significant number of students. The responsibility for achieving and maintaining high attendance rates needs to be prescribed in specific language. The board policy should:

* Acknowledge that attendance is a community concern and encourage schools to collaborate with other agencies, including law enforcement, in the SARB process.

* Acknowledge the crucial role of families in developing and promoting the solutions to school attendance problems.

* Build solutions based on the student and family's strengths and abilities to overcome barriers.

* Include formal and meaningful recognition processes for good attendance.

* Encourage accountability for accurate attendance records, including accurate truancy rates as collected for NCLB's Uniform Management Information and Reporting System on the Consolidated Application.

* Encourage accountability for submission of the Annual Statewide Student Identifier Enrollment Update to the CSIS to meet NCLB reporting requirements.

Early identification

Initially, more accuracy in school attendance and enrollment data may result in identifying more students with attendance problems. However, accurate numbers are the first step in an effective system of early identification, parental notification and intervention.

Identifying students with attendance problems as early as possible is crucial to finding the students who need, and could benefit from, school and parental help the most. A healthy, results-based school attendance program will resolve most problems at the school level, with relatively fewer students requiring SARB or court assistance.

Information about the SARB process, including the SARB Handbook and a recommended format for collecting SARB data, is available at the California Department of Education Web site at www.cde.ca.gov/42063

David Kopperud is chair of the School Attendance Review Board for the California Department of Education. He can be reached at [e-mail].