Rethinking New York City's Response to Chronic Absence

The Vera Institute released a new policy paper: “Getting Teenagers Back to School: Rethinking New York State’s Response to Chronic Absence." Below is a summary of their research. 

Nearly 40 percent of New York City high school students—about 124,000 teenagers—missed 20 or more days of school in the 2008–2009 school year. This policy brief looks at one response to the statewide problem of chronic school absence: reporting parents to the child protective system, which handles allegations of child abuse and neglect. Under New York State law, a parent or guardian who fails to ensure that his or her child attends school regularly can be found to have neglected the child. Although the term “educational neglect” is often associated with young children, more than 60 percent of the state’s educational-neglect allegations concern teenagers, particularly 15- and 16-year-olds.
The child protective system is not well equipped to help teenagers improve their school attendance. Nonetheless, educational-neglect reports involving teens consume a large portion of the child protective system’s resources and are diverting the system’s attention from children with more serious safety and neglect issues. The most common responses to teenage chronic absence around the country are punitive, contrary to what adolescent development and school engagement research tell us about what motivates teens to go to school.

Vera’s case-file review and interviews indicate that amending the child protective statute to remove teenagers from the educational-neglect process would not put these adolescents at risk of future maltreatment. Vera’s case-file review found that investigations of educational-neglect reports involving teenagers that were not accompanied by allegations of other abuse or neglect rarely found child safety threats. When measured using the state’s risk assessment tool, these cases had a very low likelihood of future maltreatment.8 Although this empirical analysis was limited to one county, child protective workers and officials from around the state agreed that educational-neglect investigations involving teenagers rarely reveal safety threats. If school personnel have any other reason—beyond absence from school—to suspect a teenager is being neglected, they would still be mandated to report their suspicions to the state child-abuse and neglect hotline.
Many child protective caseworkers and supervisors feel educational-neglect cases involving teenagers divert their attention from more serious cases.
Educational-neglect reports concerning teenagers who are not attending school consume a significant portion of the child protective system’s scarce resources. In 2009, teens alleged to be educationally neglected accounted for 6 percent of all children involved in child maltreatment reports statewide. In New York City, this figure reached 11 percent. Removing teenagers who are chronically absent could reduce the number of teenagers reported to the child protective system by up to 15,407 statewide, allowing the child protective system to focus its resources on families with child safety concerns.
Further, nearly all of the educators Vera interviewed expressed the view that schools are in a better position to address teenage chronic absence than the child protective system. Schools often have an existing relationship with families, know the communities where students live and the issues they face, and are responsible for their educational success. Moreover, school officials have problem-solving capabilities in the educational arena that child protective workers do not have. They can troubleshoot registration and enrollment issues, work to address teens’ safety concerns, navigate the special education system, and arrange for school transfers if needed. Child protective workers have no authority and little experience in these arenas. Eliminating the option of referring cases of teen chronic absence to the child protective system when there is no other reason to suspect maltreatment would thus place responsibility for teens’ attendance with those best equipped to improve it.
Our examination suggested two concurrent actions New York could take to address chronic teen absence: 1) increase schools’ accountability, system incentives, and access to services for engaging chronically absent teens; and 2) develop new approaches to reducing teen absence to address the underlying problem that Vera observed statewide and nationally: a lack of effective methods for re-engaging chronically absent teens. Implementing these strategies will require information-sharing, collaboration, and investment by state agencies including OCFS, the New York State Education Department, and the state Office of Mental Health, as well as partnerships with local school systems, county executives and mayors, an array of service providers, and funders.
 New York could develop a new approach to teenage absenteeism that is rooted in research on adolescent behavior and school engagement. The new approach would build on effective practices in some non-traditional schools and decades of research and experience in the youth development field, which has shown that building on strengths, reinforcing positive behavior, and connecting teens with a caring adult produces the best results. It would also take into account the influence of peers and other aspects of adolescent social and physiological development. This approach would replace the punishment-based responses currently in place.
Guiding principles for this new approach include:
> Use an individualized strengths-based approach, for example, identifying at least one genuine strength for each teen who is consistently absent.
> Engage the student in school-based activities that build on those strengths.
> Connect those students to a caring adult who genuinely supports them in the school community.
> Develop and sustain positive relationships between the student and the caring adult.
> Communicate regularly with parents to offer positive feedback about the youth and suggest alternatives to punishment as motivation for attending school.
> Track and recognize attendance with incentives.
Such an approach might require changes in school structure and in the roles of school personnel. Developing, testing, and bringing a new approach to scale will require investment of money, time, and effort.
In conclusion, by challenging the existing systems and traditional interventions used by communities and schools New York State is on the cutting edge of addressing chronic absence among teenagers. The first step toward more effectively addressing chronic absence among teens may be to remove them from the jurisdiction of the child protective system, while simultaneously creating a less adversarial set of interventions to keep youth connected to schools. This would allow the child welfare system to focus on the most vulnerable abused and neglected children in the state. New York State’s strategies in working with adolescents need to be informed by research on effective practices for adolescent behavior change and school engagement. By providing flexibility and incentives to localities to address the root causes of absenteeism in their communities, and offering guidance and practice that supports a strengthening of student attendance, the state will be more effective in its efforts to reduce chronic absenteeism and improve graduation rates. Developing an effective solution to chronic teen absence will improve not only the life prospects of New York’s teens, but also the safety and financial health of our communities. These proposals provide a starting place for a robust dialogue toward more effective collaborative actions.

Our Opinion
BYMC agrees with the Vera Institute's findings that educational neglect cases should be eliminated for teenagers. We support their recommendations for mitigating absenteeism.