Kent City — Lexie Snoap’s reasons for wanting to be in school every day are pretty straightforward:
“Attendance helps you get a better grade,” said the Kent City Elementary fifth-grader. “If you have a lot of absences, you’ll have less days to learn, and learning is important for you to get a job. And you also can’t get into a good college without good learning.”
That’s why Lexie made sure to sign an attendance contract at KCE’s back-to-school open house, committing to the goal of having five or fewer absences over the course of this school year. She said putting her name to paper has already helped motivate her to get up and out the door.
“Every morning, it helps you think that you have to get up and get ready for school, because you signed the contract,” she said.
‘… You gotta stay committed to your word.’
— fifth-grader JJ Sabin
This is the second year that Kent City Elementary has invited its students to sign an attendance contract, in partnership with Kent ISD’s “Strive for Less than Five” program. The contract is a way for kids to publicly commit to doing their best to be in school every day, said school social worker Teriena Schwartz.
“We noticed in the years since COVID that attendance has gone down a bit, and so we really wanted to make sure that our kids understood the importance of being here and recognized what could happen if they weren’t (in school), in terms of the outlook for their futures,” said Schwartz. “We’re working hard to get that information out to our parents, and (the contract) is just another way to make it real for our kids.”
‘When you’re not here, we miss you’
While the contract specifies a goal of five or fewer absences, Schwartz said the focus of the attendance initiative is more on awareness, providing support to families and building community at KCE. If a student has anxiety about school, for example, or if bedtime issues are causing a student to be late, Schwartz and KCE behavior coordinator Michael Pavona are working to provide resources to help families work through such issues and improve attendance.
“The school day is really just packed full, so when you’re not here, you’re missing great opportunities,” Pavona said.
Added Schwartz: “The goal isn’t necessarily that everybody is here every single day, but that more are aware of … the commitment you’ve made to your classroom, and to Kent City Elementary, to be here every day. When you’re not here, we miss you. It’s important that you’re part of this community.”
Recognizing that children may not always be in control of making it to school on time, or at all, the school this year will focus on attendance successes by grade or class rather than on an individual basis. The signed attendance contracts will hang in the school cafeteria, where Schwartz and Pavona will display attendance percentages by grade at the end of each week.
A monthly celebration will recognize the classes who have had the best attendance numbers during that time.
“If we look at it as a group effort, I think that helps feed the buy-in (from students), because you’re working collectively with your peers on (attendance),” Pavona said. “Maybe we’ll even get a little healthy competition going between grades or have our students lead some of these celebrations — I think that’s going to go a long way toward their success.”
‘Part of education means attendance’
Fifth-grader JJ Sabin couldn’t make it to the open house but made sure to sign the attendance contract as soon as he could during the first week of school. His motivation to attend school regularly is both personal and specific.
“I’ve had a dream since I was very little to go into the NFL, and my parents have always told me that you need to have a good education to be able to get into a good college,” he said. “And also, if you’re in a smaller college, like (Division 3) or something like that, you’re not going to get looked at by the NFL scouts, so if you want to get into a D1 or D2 college, you gotta have a good education.
“And part of that education means attendance. So if you’re not there, you might not be able to learn as much as the other students.”
JJ said he only had “about one” absence last school year and is hoping for the same this year. The fact that the contracts will be displayed publicly, he said, helps his efforts pay off and also helps his friends encourage each other to do the same.
“If my friends are here (in school) and they don’t see me, but they just saw me last night, then they could be like, ‘Why is he not here? He’s not sick and he signed the contract,’” JJ explained. “And then you might get your friends asking you a bunch of questions about it. So (the contract) is good because you gotta stay committed to your word.”
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