Attendance Awareness Campaign Update

A project led by Attendance Works

March 27, 2025

Kicking Off Attendance Awareness Campaign 2025!

We’re launching our 13th annual Attendance Awareness Campaign on April 2, during AAC webinar #1! This year’s theme is: Here Today, Ready for Tomorrow! Even in these changing times, ensuring children show up regularly so they can succeed remains a common ground issue that everyone can support. 

Here Today, Ready for Tomorrow! highlights the role that school plays in promoting student well-being and achievement, and emphasizes the link between regular attendance and a well-prepared, next-generation workforce.

Stay tuned for updated AAC resources! View the Count Us In! toolkit with tips for your campaign. Join us and more than 100 national and state partners working to bring more communities into our movement by signing up for updates.

Together we are making progress. Join the movement to get more kids back in school and engaged. Donate today!

Webinars

The 2025 free webinar series will emphasize key solution-oriented concepts, reflected in The 50% Challenge road map and state toolkit, that are essential to reducing chronic absence. 

Portraying what works, each webinar will feature inspiring speakers from a variety of communities and organizations who will share their successes, expertise and real-world experiences in improving attendance, well-being and achievement. 

Our first free webinar, Teams Make All the Difference for Supporting Attendance, kicks off on Wednesday, April 2, at noon PT / 3 pm ET. Everyone who registers will receive a link to the webinar recording and presentation slides.

Save the date and register for the next 3 webinars!

• May 14, Health, Well-being and Safety is Essential to Showing Up
• August 6, Student Connectedness Fosters Attendance and Engagement
• September 24, Family Engagement is the Foundation for Attendance and Learning

Excited about participating in AAC 2025? Help us to get the word out! We’ve provided a sample social media message below.

📢 The 2025 Attendance Awareness Campaign is kicking off with a conversation about building strong attendance teams! Schools and districts that form collaborative, data-driven teams see real improvements in student engagement, achievement and well-being.

🔗 Register for all 4 webinars: https://www.attendanceworks.org/resources/webinars/ 

Attendance Tools

Districts, schools and community partners can help keep students healthy and avoid unnecessary absences from school. Download our handout for educators and their partners developed in collaboration with Kaiser Permanente and the National Association of School Nurses.

Boost excitement in learning this spring – celebrate events such as Earth Day, Children’s Book Week or National Library Week.

Does your district or school provide school meals? The nonprofit FuelUp is offering K-12 schools nutrition equipment grants to help increase student participation in, and access to, nutritious school meals. The application deadline is April 8, 2025. Learn more.

Research Spotlight

Chronic absence rates in California remain stubbornly high, despite recent improvements. The Public Policy Institute of California released an analysis of data through the 2022-23 and 2023-24 school years. 

We collaborated with PACE (Policy Analysis for California Education) on an analysis of chronic absence data in California from the 2017–18 to 2023–24 school years. The brief breaks down the data into seven key facts.

Events

We’re presenting on the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading’s webinar More Hopeful Futures or Children as Collateral Damage? on April 1, 3–4:30 pm ET. The session will center the children of immigrant families. Panelists will explore the potential implications for early childhood programs and schools that serve these children and families, and highlight information, strategies and tools for use by caring communities. 

Corporate Sponsors

A special thanks to the corporate sponsors who have already committed to supporting our 2025 Attendance Awareness Campaign. Their investment makes it possible for us to provide you with free strategies and materials.

Attendance in the News

Covid’s long shadow in California: Chronic absences, student depression and the limits of money, EdSource, March 20, 2025

Chronic Absenteeism in California, Public Policy Institute of California, March 2025

SC to launch campaign aimed at boosting school attendance, WCSC LIVE5, March 17, 2025

Campaign Convening Partners

See the full list of Attendance Awareness Partners here.

Attendance Works is a non-profit, national and state initiative. Our mission is to advance success in school and beyond for all students by reducing chronic absence. Find free downloadable resources, research, consulting services and more on our website: www.attendanceworks.org

For more information contact: info@attendanceworks.org

Sign up for our newsletter: https://awareness.attendanceworks.org/contact/aam-updates

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