District administrators told the board they have a focused strategy to reduce chronic absenteeism and are seeing early results in the first quarter.

"Chronic absenteeism equals out to approximately 2 days per month... That's 18 days a year," Linda Paulus said as she explained the district’s tiered approach. She described tier 1 districtwide strategies and tier 2 targeted interventions for students at risk and noted a new collaboration with Penn State University that will include incentive events and athlete-created videos aimed at encouraging attendance. Paulus said the Penn State event for students is scheduled for Dec. 6 and that elementary students who meet attendance benchmarks will receive free tickets while parents will receive reduced-price tickets.

Paulus provided district figures reported to the state: of 2,985 students, 104 had no attendance issues last year and 1,781 had some attendance problems (ranging from at-risk to severely chronic). Of 1,353 returning students who had attendance issues last year, 713 improved by at least one tier in the first quarter and 493 had moved entirely out of at-risk categories by Nov. 6. She said the district chronic absenteeism rate dropped from 26.5% to 18.5% in the first quarter.

Board members thanked staff and requested continued updates. Administrators said they will continue outreach to families to sustain momentum.