Shawnee Mission reports drop in chronic absenteeism, details expanded attendance and mental‑health supports

The Shawnee Mission School District’s Student and Family Services team updated the Board of Education on attendance, student mental‑health initiatives and student leadership programs, reporting a districtwide drop in chronic absenteeism and outlining new supports for students and families.

The department told the board it hired six attendance specialists placed across feeder patterns plus an additional specialist supporting Horizons and Arrowhead, and that the team has done more than 2,300 individual student check‑ins and contacted nearly 2,000 parents. “I tell families I talk with that I am here as an advocate,” said Memo Rodriguez, a district attendance specialist, describing outreach and goal‑setting meetings aimed at removing barriers to school attendance.

Those attendance efforts coincided with a decrease in the district’s chronic absenteeism rate, the presentation said: December data showed a decline from 22% to 18% of students meeting the district’s 10%‑or‑more…