1. Attendance Matters A Report for the San Mateo-Foster City School Board November 5, 2015

2. The Attendance Matters Project
San Mateo County Study
A collaboration of San Mateo County School Districts,
San Mateo County Office of Education, The Big Lift, and
the Harvard Kennedy School

3. A Growing Awareness … Attendance Matters

4. The Big Lift Plan 2020 Better attendance Inspiring summers
Overall Goal
Increase the number of third graders who are reading at grade level from 58% to 80%
Overall Strategy
Pursue a “big lift” on educational outcomes via collaboration
Make Big System Policy
Provide quality preschool for underserved 3- and 4-year-olds
Sustain progress through
Aligned PreK-3 system
Strategies to improve attendance, since children from underserved families are four times more likely to be chronically absent. Instructional time matters
Inspiring summer programs that encourage reading and help children get excited about learning, since children who don’t have summer enrichment lose as much as two months of reading achievement
A key part of all of this work is engaging families to support their children’s learning,
Better attendance
Inspiring summers
Family engagement

6. Todd Rogers,
Associate Professor of Public Policy,
Harvard Kennedy School
Student Social Support R&D Lab
Todd Rogers’ research aims to shed light on the cognitive, motivational, and social barriers to student achievement, and to develop low-cost scalable interventions that are informed by behavioral science. 
Many of his research projects explore the impact on student achievement of mobilizing the support of students’ family and friends. 

7. Rogers: “Attendance strongly correlates w/success.”
Attendance predicts:
Graduation
Crime
Pregnancy
Test scores
Current best practices are:
School-centered
Social worker/truancy officer
Mentors
Intervention costs:
$60-$100 per day

8. The Attendance Matters Projects
Develops a low-cost scalable intervention addressing parental beliefs and expectations
Takes inspiration from related recent work that showed sending parents encouragements asking them to reduce students’ absences resulted in 5%-10% reductions
Subsequent surveys suggest that the encouragements may have changed parents’ beliefs about what parents thought their “job” was

9. Data and FERPA Compliance
Data Use Agreement Signed by all participating districts
Accompanied by legal brief supporting high legal standard from County Counsel John Beiers
Attendance Matters qualifies as exempt under FERPA as a research study that aims to improve academic progress. All data must be destroyed at the conclusion of the study
Attendance Matters went above standard and provided clear and equal opt-out process for all families
Families can opt out at any point during the study
Opt out removes families from the study, but NOT the data collection

10. Two Treatment Phases: K-5 and 6-12
Grades K- 5 Treatment: October – June
Absences in the early grades can negatively impact student achievement in later grades
Grades 6-12 Treatment: January – June
Sibling Attendance Awards
Pre and Post Awards
Comparative Awards

11. K-5 Communication Treatments
Sample Timeline
The overall timeline of mailings to families of K-5 students is as follows:
Mailing 1: Late October
"Attendance is important for the essential skills your child is learning."
Mailing 2: Mid November
"Allowing absences now may build habits for chronic absence later."
Mailing 3: Late February
“Students miss learning goals when absent."

12. Typical Communication K-5

13. 6-12 Communication Treatments
Sample Timeline
The overall timeline of mailings to families of 6-12 students is as follows:
Mailing 1: January
Independent Recognition and Sibling Study
Mailing 2: March
Social Comparison
Mailing 3: Late February
Attendance Recognition (Awards)

14. Typical Communication 6-12

15. Project Details Year-long (August 2015  June 2016)
Automated communications (mailings)
Native language
Parent belief-focused messaging
Behavioral science-informed messaging

16. 14 Participating Districts

17. SMCOE Webpage
matters-project.html

18. Any Questions?