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County-funded attendance engagement specialist reports caseload progress at Shakopee middle schools
Summary
Madeline Hill, an attendance engagement specialist funded by Scott County, reported on a caseload of chronically absent middle-school students, outreach methods, interventions and preliminary outcomes.
Madeline Hill, an attendance engagement specialist funded by Scott County and embedded at the Shakopee Family Resource Center, reported to the school board on April 14 on work with chronically absent students at East and West Middle Schools.
Hill said she began in July 2024 and manages a caseload comprising students who miss 30%–70% of school days; she is assigned cases after students hit those thresholds and after attendance meetings review the data. Hill described the attendance meeting model she uses: an initial in‑person meeting with family, student and relevant school and county staff to identify attendance barriers and create a plan, followed by a second in‑person follow-up to review progress and adjust interventions as needed. If a student does not improve, she said, the case can be referred to Scott County’s PATH Prevention program.
Hill reported that, of 22–24 students she has served so far this year, nine improved attendance according to goals set in initial plans, four moved to alternative settings (homeschooling, online school), one returned to the home district, and four were referred to PATH. She listed common barriers including transportation and other economic constraints, mental-health issues and academic struggles that increase anxiety about returning to school. Hill said school supports used to remove barriers include changing class schedules, alternative lunch settings, on-site therapy and teacher-provided makeup plans for missed work.
Hill described proactive communications projects districtwide to explain attendance expectations and how families can verify or report absences; she also said she maintains a bilingual community resource guide with links and a QR code to local services such as discounted rides through MBTA Connect and parent support groups.
Board members praised the relationship-driven approach. Hill said she will expand outreach to elementary attendance teams to support incoming sixth graders over the summer, assist with summer-school attendance for students she served and continue cross-district learning with other districts.
Ending: Hill concluded that school–county partnership meetings and home visits are central to her work and that the model has produced measurable early gains for a subset of students.
