Here’s a guest post from our friends at Attendance Works:

One of the most important messages we hope to convey in the first-ever nationwide Attendance Awareness Month this September is that absenteeism is a problem long before students start skipping school in high school.

New research released today drives home that point, detailing how chronic absence as early as prekindergarten can keep children from acquiring key literacy and math skills. And a news story out of Pittsburgh shows us what’s possible when schools and communities pull together to improve attendance, starting in kindergarten.

First the research: The University of Chicago Consortium on Chicago School Research (CCSR) study showed that students who attend preschool regularly are significantly more likely than chronically absent preschoolers to be ready for kindergarten and to have better attendance habits in later grades.

The study, which follows 25,000 three- and four-year-olds served by Chicago Public Schools (CPS) school-based preschool programs, finds that chronic absenteeism is rampant among preschoolers in Chicago. In 2011-2012, 45 percent of 3-year-olds and more than one-third of 4-year-olds were chronically absent, meaning they missed at least 10 percent of the school year.

These patterns are particularly problematic for students who start school with the weakest skills. Those children are the most likely to benefit from regular preschool attendance but also the most likely to be chronically absent.

The implications of this research stretch far beyond Chicago. It shows conclusively that attendance matters in the earliest grades. We keep talking about the value of early education, but it’s only valuable if children show up regularly so they get the most out of the enriched learning experience.”

Key findings from the report include:

• The more days of preschool a student misses at age 4, the lower she scores on CPS’s kindergarten readiness evaluation, even when controlling for incoming skills. Moreover, students who are chronically absent for multiple years have reading performance levels at the end of second grade that are, on average, considered “at-risk” and in need of some level of intervention.
• Students who are chronically absent in preschool are five times more likely to be chronically absent in second grade. Chronic absenteeism in preschool establishes a pattern of inconsistent attendance that is often repeated in later grades.
• African American children are almost twice as likely to be chronically absent as other students. Chronic absenteeism is also higher among students who live in high-poverty neighborhoods; however, even after taking into account neighborhood poverty, African American students are still much more likely to be chronically absent than students of any other race/ethnicity. African American students are absent more frequently because they are sick more often and because they face more logistical obstacles to getting to school.
• While parents most often report their children miss preschool because they are sick, a range of logistical obstacles, including transportation and child care issues, are also affecting attendance.   The number of absences increases when families face a greater number of challenging circumstances such as single parenthood, living in high poverty neighborhoods, poor parental health or greater dependence upon public transportation.
•  Most parents with children enrolled in preschool believe attendance is important; however, those who believe that regular preschool attendance is as important as attendance in later grades have children with significantly better attendance.

 “These findings are challenging because chronic absenteeism is so prevalent and the reasons preschoolers miss school are so diverse,” said report co-author Stacy Ehrlich. “However, there is also a clear opportunity to engage families and communities by addressing the issues that contribute to chronic absenteeism in preschool. Improving preschool attendance will require a student-by-student, family-by-family, school-by-school approach.”

That’s what is happening in Pittsburgh, where educators and community partners are focusing on attendance during the critical transition to kindergarten. A story Sunday in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette outlines some of efforts there:

• Pittsburgh Public Schools and the Allegheny County Department of Human Services launched a Focus on Attendance program started last year. A county school outreach specialist worked with school counselors at Pittsburgh King PreK-8 and Manchester PreK-8 to help 147 children. Nearly half of the students having improved attendance, and nearly half improved academic achievement.
• The United Way and its partners — including city school district and the Allegheny Intermediate Unit — recently launched a “Be There” campaign. This follows a “Hi 5! Kindergarten Here I Come” spring campaign by the United Way and other partners aimed at encouraging kindergarten registration.
• Ready Freddy — started by University of Pittsburgh’s Office of Child Development with support from the Heinz Endowments in 2006 – works in seven Pittsburgh schools to promote registering kids for kindergarten and encouraging good attendance.

Ready Freddy, which will be expanding to 30 schools, focuses on a key predictor: the first day of school, the story reports:

[Ready Freddy’s Ken] Smythe-Lestico said, “We found if we got them there on the first day, they missed half as many days as kids who missed the first day.”

For children who attend kindergarten less than 80 percent of the time, only 45 percent are proficient in reading and 46 percent in math in grade 3 in Pittsburgh.

That’s about 20 to 30 percentage points below the achievement of those who attended kindergarten at least 90 percent of the time.