Per Maine State Statute §5171, a student is considered “chronically absent” when they have missed ten percent of the school year, including excused absences and suspensions. Ten percent might sound like a lot, but in reality it only boils down to missing two days a month, a threshold much of our district has already passed. In fact, Kennebunk High School and Middle School of the Kennebunks have a combined absenteeism that in York County is only surpassed by Sanford, OOB, and Biddeford. Even Massabesic has better attendance than us, and they have been consistently rated as one of the worst high schools in the entire state. 

Last week, Kennebunk High School recorded 503 absences, which averages out to roughly 100 students out of school every single day. 28% of students, 196 to be specific, are considered by the State to be chronically absent. Because of these pretty poor numbers, the entire district is being required to establish “attendance review teams” to review each chronically absent student. If you’ve had more than 12 absences this year (I know I have) you can probably be expecting a call home, and it’s rumored that home visits from administrators accompanied by resource officers may become the norm. 

The high school isn’t the only school in the district struggling to keep students in class; last week Kennebunk Elementary School had 124 absences, Consolidated had 107, M. L. Day had 60, Sea Road had 79, and MSK had 201. Each school has an individual task force working to improve attendance, and some of the causes principals identified before the school board last week include illness, physical therapy, ski vacations, and just intentionally skipping. 

In the State of Maine as a whole, chronic absenteeism is on the rise. After COVID, many families’ attitudes towards attendance have become more lax, and there is growing concern about what long-term impacts this could have on students’ success. Even though teachers can assign homework for the days a student misses, it doesn’t compensate for the missed in-person instructional time with teachers. We saw an amplified version of this problem during the pandemic, where students across the board struggled with distance learning. The district pulled some of its worst standardized test scores ever during and in the aftermath of the COVID lockdowns, demonstrating first hand to school leaders how detrimental it can be to keep students out of the classroom. 

Solving RSU21’s new problems with absenteeism is going to come down to collaboration between students, parents and administrators about how best to keep kids from cutting class.