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High schoolers skip class in large numbers

DPS board to discuss report at Monday meeting

Nancy Mitchell, Rocky Mountain News

Published June 16, 2007 at midnight

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An analysis of Denver Public Schools attendance shows that large numbers of high school students are skipping classes, with 42 percent of the students at one school racking up more than 65 days missed this past school year.

That school, West High School near downtown, led all traditional DPS schools in missed days, but other high schools were not far behind.

In all, 38 percent of students at North and 30 percent of kids at Lincoln also had more than 65 absences in the 2006-07 school year.

A controversial new policy closing high school campuses at lunchtime - an initiative started last fall by Superintendent Michael Bennet to improve attendance - appears to have had little impact, the report found.

Bennet could not be reached for comment late Friday. Theresa Peña, president of the Denver school board, said she had not studied the report and could not comment.

Board members are expected to discuss the data publicly Monday during an informal work session.

The report will be the first in-depth look at the attendance issue in DPS in years, Peña said.

Board members had been asking about the closed-campus policy's impact, she said.

"More butts in seats, we think, translates to higher student achievement," she said.

Overall average attendance in DPS increased slightly this past school year, to 89.2 percent from 88.8 percent, the report found.

But it said that was largely because more students were faithfully showing up in charter schools.

Traditional DPS schools saw a slight attendance drop, according to the analysis.

Charter schools typically have a special emphasis and are run by independent groups of parents or others under school board contract.

For example, KIPP Sunshine Peak Academy, part of a national nonprofit charter network that emphasizes academic rigor for largely minority and poor students, recorded a 98 percent average attendance rate.

The data failed to support anecdotal evidence that Hispanic students might show larger drops in attendance because families return to Mexico for winter holidays or other events.

That was "not demonstrated," the report said, with all ethnic groups showing a steady decline in attendance from the beginning of the school year to the end.

Other findings in the report:

• Attendance varies based on class subject. Middle and high school students were less likely to show up for core academics courses such as math than for elective classes such as music and foreign language.

• Students in the middle school grades of 6, 7 and 8 were more likely to attend class if enrolled in schools serving grades kindergarten through eighth grade, rather than in traditional middle schools.

• Overall attendance in all grades declines from the beginning of the school year to the end. The decline is most significant in the 8th grade, dropping almost 10 percent through the year. But students in the 12th grade show a dramatic increase at the end of the year.

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