With just 78% of Pennsylvania students regularly attending school, educators, judges and service providers say the state must take a more collaborative approach to reduce chronic absenteeism.
Officials with the Pennsylvania Department of Education told members of the Senate Education Committee on Monday that they are meeting with leaders at the Department of Human Services to come up with more creative solutions.
"We are creating that partnership to create some best practices and resources for all the local education agencies because this is an area of concern," said Amy Lena, Deputy Secretary for the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education.
But Samantha Murphy with the Allegheny County Department of Human Services told lawmakers that more local coordination between schools and service providers is needed as well.
"We have to have these conversations together," Murphy said. "It's great that they happen up at the top, but they have to happen locally, to actually know each other and do better."
Research shows missing large amounts of school is a leading indicator of whether a student is likely to read proficiently by third grade or graduate from high school, especially in low-income households.
Students are deemed chronically absent if they miss 10% or more of days in the school year. According to data from Pittsburgh Public Schools, that applies to more than 37% of district students.
Even higher rates of chronic absenteeism are seen among PPS students experiencing homelessness and in foster care, at 64% and 58% chronically absent, respectively.
"Placing kids in foster care doesn't fix school attendance," Murphy told lawmakers. "It actually makes it much, much worse."
Many speakers at Monday's hearing said schools need more state support in order to increase parent engagement and create a positive culture around school attendance.
Schools can only monitor and address student absences in a timely way if they have the staff to do so, said Adam Oldham, a counselor at a Big Spring High School in Cumberland County.
"It's great when an elementary school has a school counselor. A lot of schools don't have that," Oldham said. "Or if they do, that school counselor is responsible for two other elementary school buildings that they have to travel to."
Chronic absenteeism rates are based on both excused and unexcused absences. A student is deemed "truant", on the other hand, if they accumulate three or more unexcused absences.
According to state law, schools must notify the family once a student becomes truant and hold a meeting to create a school attendance improvement plan before taking legal action.
But educators and judges told lawmakers Monday that the support they can offer families through that process is limited, as are the partnerships available.
"We don't have all hands on deck. We don't have everybody willing to play a role," said judge Gary Whiteman of Lycoming County. "It comes down to the school district, the parents and us."
Once a student has six or more unexcused absences, schools can file a truancy citation against a student or their parent with the local magisterial district judge.
Judges can then require families to pay fines of up to $300 for the first offense, $500 for the second offense and $750 for the third offense. But Whiteman said fines rarely act as an effective deterrent to future truancy, and families are often unable to afford the fines they are assessed.
"You could have truancy payment plans that go for five years," Whiteman. "At $20 a month, it's not a deterrent."
Whiteman also said that rather than go back to class, many truant students will opt for online courses instead, or enroll at a cyber charter school.
"The ability of students to be mobile and hop from school to school, or option to option, to us appears to be actions which deflect their accountability for not being in any of those," he said.
Murphy of Allegheny County said schools know what's driving chronic absence and truancy at their schools, but often face difficulty accessing needed resources outside their buildings, especially as students rack up additional absences.
"All of a sudden it's a crisis because you gave people time but didn't really offer tools to address what's happening," she said.