The Current - When kids miss a lot of class, how can teachers help?

Episode Date: February 28, 2025

Students who miss a lot of class sometimes tell teachers that they’re not showing up because they’re afraid of how far they’ve already fallen behind. Other times, they say their mom signed them out so they can get an Iced Capp. Matt Galloway asks educators what they’re doing to help kids overcome chronic absenteeism — and at what age students have to take responsibility for themselves. 

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This is a CBC podcast. Hello, it's Matt here. Thanks for listening to The Current, wherever you're getting this podcast. Before we get to today's show, wonder if I might ask a favor of you if you could hit the follow button on whatever app you're using There is a lot of news that's out there these days We're trying to help you make sense of it all and give you a bit of a break from some of that news, too So if you already follow the program, thank you

And if you have done that maybe you could leave us a rating or review as well The whole point of this is to let more listeners find our show and perhaps find some of that information that's so important in these really tricky times. So thanks for all of that. Appreciate it. And on to today's show. Last week we heard from a lot of you about our story on kids missing school. Chronic absenteeism is an issue across this country. It was called a crisis on this very program.

This issue of chronic absenteeism is when a student misses at least 10% or about 20 days of the school year. We spoke with Seamus White. He's in grade 12. He struggled with his mental health in recent years and with that, his attendance at school started to suffer. Often I kinda just seem to look for any excuse to not go. If I've got maybe an itch in my throat or a little bit of an upset stomach.

That becomes a lot bigger than it should be and I kind of just refuse to even start my morning. Seamus' dad told us that some weeks getting his son to class for one day in that week can be a victory. But it's not just students and parents who are dealing with this issue. This morning we're going to hear from those working in schools and with the schools. Dante Luciani is a grade nine and 10 teacher at a

school in downtown Hamilton, Ontario. Chris Hicks is a principal in the Red River Valley, a rural area south of Winnipeg and chairperson of the school, pardon me, the council of school leaders. It represents all principals and vice principals in Manitoba. And Aaron Fitzgerald is an attendance counsellor in North Bay, president of the Ontario Association for Counselling and Attendance Services.

Good morning to you all. Good morning, Matt. Morning, Matt. Dante, let's start with you. If you look out into your classroom, what is that issue of chronic absenteeism look like? It could look like usually a handful of students anywhere. It could be anywhere from three to five that have a pattern of, I would say,

missing at least once, one period a week. It could look worse during first period when I could have maybe only half my class there at the beginning of class when I take attendance and then they either slowly trickle in or they don't come in and I might see some students twice a week. I might see some students once every two weeks. I might see some students only a handful of times throughout the whole semester. And the concerning part is often I see these students in the hallways, right? You see them in the hallways every day, but they're not going to class.

I want to come back to that and find out why in just a moment and what they're saying to you. But Chris, from your perspective, I mean, you're a principal, you're a head of the Principals Association in Manitoba. What do you hear and what do you see in your own school? Oh, sure. It varies, I'm going to say, across the province, I'm going to say in bigger centers, what was just described earlier is quite common. I would say that more and more students are, you cited Seamus early in the beginning there, and I think students are finding that school can be very, very difficult to rationalize or justify. But ten school days in a year, yeah, I would consider that province-wide that you wouldn't have any trouble finding anybody who could cite that as a problem at all. But most-

Dante, when you talk to those students, Dante, who aren't showing up in your class, maybe you bump into them in the hallway, maybe you hear from them, what do they say about why they aren't there, Why they aren't where they're supposed to be? I've heard everything from my mom signing me out so I could get an ice cap to mental health struggles. I've heard everything from I just don't know to I'm too far behind and I'm afraid and I'm worried about the work that's piling up. For every student, there's a unique situation as to why they're not showing up. There are patterns. The most concerning pattern I see is the, I've been signed out and that is very frustrating for our admin. It's frustrating for our teachers. It's frustrating because it's being enabled at times. But there are students who are facing, you know,

significant challenges in school and attendance is one of them. And there's serious things happening in their outside life that are impacting them from showing up. And that's concerning as well. But there are a million different reasons that I hear and that I see and it's very concerning as a teacher. Aaron, I wanna bring you in, but I just heard Chris

in the background with the ice cap comment. I think you had a reaction to that. Do those, I mean, I'm not saying they're excuses, but do those issues that are brought up, do they sound familiar in terms of what, again, you're hearing in your district and what you're hearing from other principals? Absolutely, I mean, thank you for having us on the show

and talking about this complex issue of school attendance. You know, I think COVID began implications in playing out this massive gap in learning with students. So when we were detached from school, it wasn't just the learning gap, but also the socialization gap. So I feel that the students are still working through some of these difficulties. And certainly as attendance counselors, we're trying to help advocate for the right, basic right of education for all students across the board.

But it does vary across the province and across the country. But we're certainly seeing the need to improve on this relationship building. I did hear Seamus indicate the board in class. Often we sometimes see that when they're disconnected from that work, that they have that lack of understanding because of the gap in learning from non-attendance. Um, and so we see that cycle perpetuate itself. You're an attendance counselor.

What does that mean? What do you, what do you do? Um, again, here in Ontario, provincially duties and titles are not standardized. So it does vary across the province, but majority, um, you know, there's attendance counselors, uh, slash social workers, but there's other titles like behavioral consultant, student well-being coaches, re-engagement counselors.

So typically, attendance counselors see though what we would call tier three students, the top tier severe chronic cases, missing sometimes 50 to 80% of the school year. So extreme attendance concerns. And attendance counsellors try to be that bridge between home, school and community. So you know, we will try and do full case conferences involving all the players that might be involved with the student. You know, we do do door knocks to the family to help see how we can help support and better connect. Are you like the 2025 version of like a truancy counselor?

Is that? We, we are the truancy counselors. Our association started in 1954, um, you know, over 70 years ago as truancy officers. Uh, we now, we don't police the, we want to counsel, uh, students now. And again, trying to get them connected to services and resources that they

may not even know about. Dante, as a teacher, what can you do when a student's attendance becomes concerning? These aren't kids, they're young adults. Um, and so I just wonder, what are the options that you have in front of you? I think Aaron nailed it right there with, you know, having the community, the school, and the family work together.

So as a teacher, I'll tell you how I go about it. My first connection is with the student, and I show them that, you know, their attendance matters and this is why, and I care, and this is why I care about them, and I want to see them do well. And I try to meet them where they're at, because if I have five students I'm really concerned about attendance-wise, like we said earlier, there there's gonna be five different reasons why. It's gonna take five different approaches. So I try to meet them where they are, try to understand where they're coming from, why they're not attending, how I

can help, then I connect with the family because the family is the primary educator, right? As much as I value my position as a teacher and how much influence we have as teachers, we're always gonna be second to the family. That's where they learn the most. So working with the family, we are both twice as powerful. The parents will be twice as powerful, the educators will be twice as powerful in helping influence these students. So by working with them and having a connection there, we are able to best support the student and it all starts there. More immediately, are you able to impose consequences for those students who don't show up?

I mean, in terms of docking marks, failing the students, what have you? No, no, no, we are not able to dock marks if a student is absent, because that is not assessing their learning, right? We assess their learning by what they turn in, by what they do in class. Now, obviously, if things aren't being submitted,

then yes, then that's where the consequences fall. But the the funny thing is is that I'll have students not attend class but they get their work in because everything is posted on our learning modules online and they can submit them so it's almost like they are doing it through correspondence while not um attending. Now that's some students that is some students not all my students that have that have absenteeism are doing that. And that's the concern, that's the ones I'm most concerned about. Chris, your school is what kindergarten through grade 12, is that right?

Yes, yes. So is this mostly an issue with teenagers, students who would be in the grades, you know, nine, 10, 11, 12, or are younger kids also missing school at an alarming rate, if I can put it that way? Well, if a seven-year-old is missing 10 school days in a year, that's alarming to me,

but it would mostly be on the family, and so we would never sort of talk to the student directly about why they're not coming to school. We would talk to the family if it's someone that old. But teenagers, yes, and teenagers are much more in control of their own emotions and their own realities. And so just like what we've heard already, those are direct conversations you can have with kids and ask them direct questions about when you come to the school, do you feel like someone will stand up for you? Is there someone

in the building, an adult, and I mean an adult, are there adults there that you can go to and talk to you feel safe with? Or is the physical environment the physical environment, you know, does it feel like it's a safe place for you? Do you feel culturally relevant there? Do you feel like the, the, the scenarios that you confront are helpful to you? And if not, well, then tell us how we can, how we can help that.

So tell me more about this in terms of what's going on from your perspective. I mean, it's not just kids who are checking out to get an ice cap. There's something else that's going on more broadly. So Chris, what do you think is actually happening? Oh, I think a lot of kids are in crisis themselves. They don't have any sense of belonging. They don't have any sense of relationship with people.

They may have financial concerns. Poverty is always a big issue. Manitoba started a task force on attendance about a year before COVID happened. So, I mean, we were concerned about attendance before that even. And in large part, because it wasn't that we weren't seeing kids not coming to school,

we were finding that we couldn't find them, that they were actually going missing. And through all of our resources and contacts, we have a lot of information available to us about how to get ahold of kids if we can't, but we're just finding too many of them were just missing. We don't know where they are. And so that became very, very concerning as well,

in Manitoba at least. How did the pandemic change that? Well, the pandemic exacerbated probably issues that were already, uh, formulating with some kids. But it also, it also sort of invited a kind of platform where, like, uh, like Dante just said about kids who may miss school, but get their work done because they were, you know, they, they,

they maybe thrived a little better in that environment. They didn't have to attend school. They didn't have to deal with all the pressures and the adults around them all the time. But it also gave them like an idea that social isolation impacted them mentally, impacted them psychologically,

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Erin, you are the connection point between the school and the family, and part of your work is to try to get those students who are not in class back in class. What do you do? How do you go about encouraging them to get back into the class or creating the conditions such that they feel like going to school is a good thing? Right. And we work with families with individualized approach because there is such a large spectrum of challenges that families face when it comes to attendance. Keeping in mind that attendance is a secondary issue, there's always a primary issue going on within the family dynamic that they may not bring to the school level. Again, out of

you know, maybe shame, embarrassment, there could be mental health challenges going on in the family. You know, there could be family addictions they're dealing with, social-emotional difficulties, there could be homelessness, or even simple things, lack of food to send, you know, that parent keeps them home out of shame. So we really have to look at what is happening within that family and try and meet them where they're at.

And the focus really is on relationship building, right? Is making those safe spaces within the school and developing and cultivating them in the community as well. How successful are you in getting those students back? I mean, are there students perhaps who never go back to class? Uh, again, success is defined in many different ways. And I think that goes to that lack of Canadian data and research on who is out, who hasn't returned.

We unfortunately sometimes there is no contact with families and they are demented from the schools. We've seen an increase in our home schoolers. So there are multiple factors that go into why a student isn't returning. And again, the caseload sizes and the amount of manpower, we know that our mental health services are lacking. We know our attendance counselors need more. So again, there's a multitude of systematic issues going on as well.

Seamus White, who we heard from earlier in the introduction in many ways was the anchor of our conversation when we had this discussion last week. Here he is again, talking about what he hears from his teachers about his absences. They are kind of indifferent mostly. Maybe the odd side comment like, hey, you really should be getting to class,

but no genuine concern about anything. Dante, what do you make of that? How much of this is an issue on teachers to, to motivate those students to come into the class and get excited about learning? Yeah, I mean, well, here's the thing. Seamus was a grade 12, I believe. Yes. Right.

Uh, so in some ways that, that grade 12 at that point has to, I mean, let's, let's, let's be real that, that, that student's going to have to find that motivation on their own by then. Now a teacher can always be there to support, but as a teacher primarily grade nines and tens, I'm trying to ensure that we're making progress so that by grade 12, this isn't an issue. But I do feel as teachers,

we need to make our classrooms a place where students wanna be. You know what I mean? Whether that's providing a safe space, whether that's providing relevant learning that these students know that they can actually use in their life. Let's be real, our students have a good detector of when they're just jumping through hoops and when this is something they can really sink their teeth into. Can I ask you just about the teacher's responsibility? Yes, because one of the

things we heard from a lot of people in the wake of our initial conversation was that they're also concerned about teachers missing a lot of days and how that affects learning and students willingness to go to school because they don't see a connection because the teacher may not be in class, that your teacher may be out on a regular basis. What do you make of those concerns, Dante?

I think that's completely valid. Absolutely. You know what I mean? If we're going to stand here and preach showing up, then we need to show up too as teachers. I have no problem with people bringing up concerns about teachers not showing up if that's the case, because I believe, yeah, we need to have some integrity. And if we are going to hold our students to a high standard, then we better hold ourselves to a high standard as well. Chris, as a principal, what impact is teacher absenteeism having on student absenteeism? Oh, it has an incredible impact.

And I've also noticed, I think Shane, sorry, Dante is right about that. We've definitely noticed a rise in teacher absenteeism and it probably has a lot to do with the public narrative encouraging people to take care of themselves before they try to take care of others. And maybe it's gotten to be a little too extravagant now, but the fact is that yes,

exactly, if teachers want to engage students, they themselves have to engage and seek whatever supports they need to do that. We're certainly willing to do that, but that, that relationship between a student and a teacher is absolutely critical. Just in the last couple of minutes that we have, um, people have referred to this as a crisis. You have all laid out from your own experience, what you're seeing. What's one thing that we can do briefly to, to

make a meaningful, um, dent in this, Chris? Well, I would say we talk about it. I have no problem talking to a high school students specifically about just about anything. But definitely make that the forefront of your of your programming and what you're promoting in your programming. And whether it means you're you're going to get more creative and more innovative in your classroom instruction or your environment. That's fine. But make it actually something that you talk about, make it very transparent what the consequences are for not attending regularly and what the potential like long-term effects could be

and make that a real thing for them to understand. Dante, what about for you? You're just about off to classroom right now. Who knows who you'll be standing in front of? What is the one thing that you think we should do, we broadly should do to address this in a meaningful way? We've got to adapt in education. The world is, let's be real, look how fast the world is moving, right? We need to adapt and can we keep up? No, but we can try, right? So like I've got kids

who can, you know, I had a student like 12 years ago, mining his own Bitcoin before Bitcoin was a thing. He was doing that not because of what he learned at school, but what he was teaching himself outside of school. Our students are, but what he was teaching himself outside of school. Our students have so many opportunities to learn outside of school. We need to compete with that, right? We need to make sure that they're not just doing worksheets when they come to our class. They're really, like I said, sinking their teeth into relevant learning that can help them enhance their lives. Aaron, very briefly, last word to you. What's at stake here, do you think? Well, I hope that as a community, we believe that

every school day counts to give all Canadian children the advantage of basic high school education, encourage families to reach out for those connections, find out where your resources and supports are and continuing those schools on bringing that positive environment and nurturing relationship to all of those students and families.

There's no easy solution, but hopefully together we can make some connections. Really glad to talk to you all about this. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you so much for having us. Dante Luciani is a grade nine and 10 teacher at a school in downtown Hamilton, Ontario.

Chris Hicks is a principal in the Red River Valley. It's a rural area south of Winnipeg, also chairperson of the council of school leaders, representing all principals and vice principals in the province of Manitoba. And Aaron Fitzgerald is an attendance counsellor in North Bay, president of the Ontario Association for Counselling and Attendance Services. We had this second conversation because of

the response to the first conversation that we had on the issue of school attendance and what people have called a crisis when it comes to school attendance. And so your thoughts on this are welcome. You can reach us as ever through the email, thecurrentatcbc.ca. For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.