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Task force briefed on rising chronic absenteeism; data errors and methodology clarified
Summary
KLRD presented five-year chronic absenteeism tables showing a statewide rise from 17.5% (2021) to 19.5% (2025); staff and KSDE clarified the metric is chronic absenteeism (students missing 10%+ of the year) and pledged to correct apparent data-entry outliers.
KLRD staff walked the Joint Committee through updated outcome packets and a five-year table of district chronic absenteeism rates, saying statewide chronic absenteeism rose from 17.5% in 2021 to 19.5% in 2025 after a peak of 21.8% in 2023. Jennifer Light of KLRD told lawmakers the tables start with statewide totals and then list districts so members can compare local performance.
Members focused on outliers and display issues. Representative McDonald and others flagged a Chase County entry near 90% for 2025; Dr. Nugent said that value “might be an input error on their part” and KLRD said it would check and correct the online table and footnotes. KLRD also fixed a cut-off in the printed footnote and added a color-key to the chart.
The committee spent substantial time clarifying what the numbers measure. Dean Ziets of KSDE explained the tables report chronic absenteeism – the share of students missing 10% or more of the school year – not a day-by-day attendance percentage: “it doesn't mean that they've actually missed 40% of their time in education if they have a chronic absenteeism rate of 40%,” he said. KSDE and KLRD agreed to provide follow-up analysis on outliers and to supply district-level ratio metrics (percent of students by enrollment) in a subsequent update.
Next steps: KLRD will correct typographical and data-entry errors in the published packet, and staff said follow-up materials on per-student ratios and district explanations for outliers will be circulated to the task force.
