Attendance Truancy Tracking
- Pamela Wolfe
- David Plaskett
- Aaron Souza
Implemented 11/2022 at K-8 buildings (No MPC @ time of launch)
Creator of Plugin - Phoenix Learning System
Idea: A system that displays on a single page a list of the kids who met x, y, and z thresholds based on daily (K-8) attendance and easily generates the letters as needed. Also needed a way to track the date that the letter was sent easily, all on one screen. (AKA take the 201 truancy screens + 201 truancy SQL reports smashed into a single screen).
How do I find kids who met the thresholds?
From the start page on PS, click on Attendance under Functions.
Click on the Reports tab (if you’re already not there)
Under the heading of “Attendance Tracking” > “Attendance Tracking by ADA using Time to Day”
EUI
Awaiting answer for if plugin will be updated for EUI or if will will need a custom link.
On this screen, you’ll see students, their grade level, the year to date (heading of total absences), a way to enter in their dates that a letter was sent to them, and then at what point the thresholds were met.
If you wanted to additionally filter down to say only those kids who have more than 13 absences, update the dropdown and then hit submit. (To reset the view, select to “All at Default Starting Level”.)
Clicking the student’s name will pop open their Quick Lookup screen, so you can take a quick glance at what’s going on.
How do I enter a date for the student?
Click on the ‘TRACK’ link between the student’s name and the thresholds. It’ll bring up another page for you to enter the dates as the date on which you sent out the letter #1, 2 or 3.
Here’s a screenshot where it’ll take the additional dates that you can enter in.
Hitting submit will send you back to the overall student listings.
How do I print a letter for the kid?
Clicking on the threshold # will open up another screen with the letter already pre-formatted and ready to print.
If we had different letters,, clicking on the threshold # would generate the different letters.
Where there is an asterisk ( * ) next to the threshold number, that will generate the same letter except for Spanish.
What about the 201 truancy page that I filled out?
The dates were copied out and imported back on Monday, November 7th as we were in the process of implementing this system.
Going forward, you’ll want to use this process as the 201 truancy page will become more ‘historical’ driven, and the fields will not be editable.
What about those dates that I had already entered on the 201 truancy page?
The dates were copied over on Monday, November 7th, 2022 into these fields so some dates are already prepopulated as those were the letters that were sent out on those dates.
How to count absences?
This system is looking only at the student’s daily attendance and the number of minutes that the student was in attendance vs the threshold numbers. Depending on the grade level (see table below) and number of minutes that the student was in attendance will determine whether the student receives full, partial or no credit for the day. Based on the ‘no credit’ (meaning absent) thresholds will dictate if a student is on this list or not. (Note: Partial days do make the counts look ‘strange’).
Grade Level | No Credit | Half Credit (.5) | Full Credit |
|---|---|---|---|
K - 1 | 0 - 119 minutes | 120 - 239 minutes | 240+ minutes |
2-8 | 0 - 149 minutes | 150-299 minutes | 300+ minutes |
*Remember, LUNCH and RECESS aren’t instructional minutes so they’re excluded from the total minutes of attendance.
Example 4th grader. This student for the YTD absences (at the time of running this, had 14 absences). How did we get that?
Looking at the daily absences and using the chart, we can count any time where there’s a zero minutes in attendance as a full day. (Thus the numbers in the circle, total days = 12). Then we can add the 1/2 days (which from the chart above is anything from 150- 299 minutes in attendance). There’s 4 days of those (indicated by the square box, then added together to make 2 full days)
So, in total we had 14 total full days out (based on 0 minutes attended) and 4 half credit / partial days to make an additional 2 full days of being out. Added together and you get the YTD (at the time of running) absences.
Yes, it’s also imperative to also include that yes dates in the future will count towards these thresholds.
… But the quick lookup screen doesn’t match… why??
Whenever looking at this student, the YTD absences on the quick lookup, only show the real (or full-day) absences, not the partial days
How can the thresholds and/or letters get changed?
Each school can have a different threshold limit and different verbiage on the letters. If that’s something that you or your admin is interested in, have them create a tech ticket and we’ll get it in the works.