Lewiston schools show high tardies, propose regular attendance dashboard updates

Lewiston Public Schools administrators presented an attendance dashboard to the school committee on Oct. 20, saying unexcused absences are the largest category and that the district can now drill down to school, student and reason-level data.

The dashboard, shown by Assistant Superintendent Karen Paquette, displays current enrollment, the number of students absent in the last five school days, absence reasons and trend lines by month and school year. "Absent unexcused is the biggest," Paquette said, adding that illness and medical appointments are the next-most-common codes.

Paquette urged the committee to treat tardies and chronic absenteeism as districtwide priorities: "When you have 6,000 tardies in the past 30 days, that's a lot — that's a lot of missed time for students," she said. She noted the system counts daily attendance; a full-day absence counts as one absence, while missing a single period is recorded as a tardy.

The presentation clarified the district's tracking and enforcement thresholds. Paquette said the dashboard flags 59 students in one count labeled "truant," but that that figure included students no longer enrolled; the active caseload "is 20 or less," she said. Committee members were told chronic absenteeism is defined as missing at least 10% of school days (so with 37 days into the year, missing four days qualifies).

Superintendent Jake Langley and committee members asked that the dashboard become a regular agenda feature. Langley said the district will provide the data every other meeting and can bring staff to provide deeper analyses on request: "We can drill down to school, race, number of days absent — you name it," Paquette said.

Committee debate during the presentation focused on where responsibility lies for improving attendance. Member Megan Hurd (Ward 6) said expectations of parents and state enforcement are part of the solution: "Lewiston as a district can only do so much if parents aren't being parents and aren't being responsible for getting their kids to school," she said. Langley and other members acknowledged district steps to improve data quality and communications.

Public commenters also raised related concerns. Matthew Egren (Ward 4) asked for clarity between "lack of access" and "no transportation" and warned that repeated tardiness can create workforce readiness problems after graduation. District staff told the committee there were no additional transportation grant dollars available and that last year the district was "very, very over on transportation," with a figure mentioned in the meeting as "to the tune of, like, 1.2" (unit not specified in the transcript).

The committee requested follow-up on several items raised in the presentation: clearer communications about excused-vs.-unexcused absences and pre-approval processes for planned absences, targeted drilldowns to identify geographic or demographic concentration of absences, and ongoing reporting on chronic absenteeism and truancy cases.

Provenance: Topic began with the agenda announcement that "Agenda item number 5 is to receive an update on attendance data" and concluded when public comments on transportation and tardiness closed and the meeting moved to the next agenda item.

Ending: Committee members asked staff to return with further analysis and to place the attendance dashboard on a recurring agenda so the committee can monitor trends and interventions over the school year.