Dr. Walter Lambert, who oversees attendance and student safety for the district, reported to the board that the district received 86 requests for attendance hearings during the previous school year and held 47 formal hearings. "Out of that, you're talking about 0.8 percent of our kids that had issues with their attendance," Lambert said, adding that on a broader count of students who meet longer‑run thresholds the figure is closer to 1.4 percent.

Lambert explained the district's thresholds for attendance hearings — typically 10 days of unexcused absences or 18 combined excused and unexcused days, depending on medical notes and circumstances — and said the students who reached hearing thresholds missed about 2,100 days in total, roughly 24 days per student on average. About half of missed days were excused and half unexcused, and only 19 percent of students who reached hearing thresholds had a medical excuse.

Most hearings came from high schools, Lambert said, followed by middle and elementary schools. He described several responses used to address chronic absence: individualized meetings with parents and principals, targeted supports, occasional involvement of the school resource officer for home outreach, and filing education‑neglect complaints with the prosecutor's office when families do not respond. Lambert said roughly 55 percent of families responded and participated in hearings; for nonresponding cases the district may file with prosecutors or refer to the Department of Child Services when appropriate.

Lambert said some hearings lead to improved attendance and that administrators are asking principals to flag early‑warning students in the first weeks of school to schedule proactive hearings. "Sometimes there's some good wins," Lambert said, but he also cautioned that some students remain chronically absent year to year.

Why it matters: chronic absenteeism is linked to lower academic outcomes; the district's approach combines school‑level interventions, family contact and, when necessary, legal referrals to try to improve attendance early in the fall.