Written by TalkingPoints
Every September, Attendance Awareness Month reminds us of a simple truth: the more students show up to school, the more they learn.
Supporting districts, schools, educators, and families in making that happen is at the heart of the Attendance Awareness movement. And while September shines a spotlight on attendance, the work to reduce chronic absenteeism doesn’t stop when October starts. Addressing chronic absenteeism requires ongoing focus and commitment throughout the entire year.
During September, TalkingPoints shared strategies and tools to help districts strengthen their attendance efforts. Here’s a look at the themes we touched upon.
Simple proven tips to improve student attendance
Sometimes the most powerful changes come from simple, actionable steps. Our 5 Tips for Improving Student Attendance blog highlights ways districts can immediately connect with and leverage their most valuable attendance asset— families!
Rebuilding trust, removing barriers, and maintaining momentum can build stronger family-school partnerships that keep students coming back. The five tips include:
- Meet families where they are
- Message families in their preferred language
- Make it easier for everyone – families and staff
- Address root causes
- Share positive, proactive behavior updates
Explore these tips in detail
Building frameworks for sustainable attendance success
Ensuring students attend school will always be a moving target. New students, shifting family dynamics, societal changes, and other environmental factors mean attendance strategies must continually adapt to be successful. That’s why having a strong framework backed by research is essential for building systems that last.
Our September 30 webinar, Turning the Attendance Tide: 4 Steps to Measurable Impact, focused on evidence-based frameworks and tools that strengthen attendance systems month after month and year after year.
If you missed the live session, you can watch the recording here to learn how to apply the four steps in your own district.
Turning collaboration into results: National attendance partnerships
This year’s Attendance Awareness Campaign, led by Attendance Works, brought together districts, educational agencies, organizations, nonprofits, and more to promote the theme Here Today, Ready for Tomorrow.
We were proud to be a partner and sponsor of the campaign, sharing resources, tools, and support to advance the mission. As part of this collaboration, Attendance Works highlighted our commitment to the campaign in a blog, Here Today, Ready for Tomorrow: TalkingPoints Supports Attendance Awareness Month. Read how this shared effort is helping districts implement attendance strategies that impact student outcomes.
Smart tools that help districts drive attendance gains
Behind every successful attendance initiative are tools that support it. For more than a decade, we’ve partnered with schools and districts to build a platform that fuels student success through family engagement.
Our Attendance Improvement Plus Package puts school-family partnerships at the center of addressing absenteeism using communication, data, and research to remove barriers that impact student attendance.
Discover how we are helping districts:
- Use targeted messaging to quickly engage at-risk students
- Get a centralized view of attendance data at the school and district level with a real-time dashboard
- Automate daily attendance messages to quickly and easily engage with families
- Send research-based messages that educate on the importance of attendance
- Consolidate attendance-related messages for office staff, making day-to-day work easier
- Ensure all of the above reaches all families with a text-first model, sent in their home language, enabling easy replies
Turning awareness into year-round action
Attendance Awareness Month may be over, but the work continues. The more students show up to school, the more they learn— and that’s the ultimate goal. We’re proud to support this year-round mission and look forward to continuing the progress together.
Connect with the TalkingPoints team for more information and to learn about our special pricing and pilot program.
Celebrating 10 years of partnership and impact
For a decade, TalkingPoints has supported students, families, and educators through the power of effective family-school partnerships. We connect 9 million+ educators, students, and family members annually and have facilitated more than one billion conversations—building trust, fostering relationships, and fueling student success. Named by Common Sense Education as “the best overall family communication platform for teachers and schools,” TalkingPoints drives measurable gains in attendance and academic achievement, backed by rigorous, causal research.
TalkingPoints is the only nonprofit platform with the impact focus and funding model to turn engagement strategies into lasting results—helping systems improve and every student succeed.
Join us in building a future where every child has the support they need to thrive.