Schools battle drops in attendance by breaking barriers to education

As school districts in the Eugene-Springfield area are seeing drops in attendance this school year, educators are working to break barriers to education.

Marisa woloszyn."

With the holiday break approaching, at this point students, families and teachers are pretty familiar with the ups and downs of distance learning.

Administrators say that largely-- attendence rates and engagement levels are down from last fall, with in-person learning... but as kezi 9 news anchor chris lueneburg shows us, the solutions districts are coming up with may make the school community stronger in the long run.

It's a refrain you'll hear from teachers nationwide.

"it's my eighth year at north now and i feel like a first-year teacher again."

For north eugene high school japanese language teacher nathan goldberg, it's a reality that hits home.

Literally.

It's where he teaches lessons from a makeshift classroom.

"for me it's taking twice the time to plan all of these."

He says the fall term started strong-- with high attendance from students craving a semblance of normalcy.

"that has since dropped off, as the challenges, the reality of what we are trying to do from teaching and what students are doing on their end has set in."

In the first six weeks at eugene school district 4j, attendance has dropped about 2 percent compared to last year.

"it's down from last year, but not as much as we had feared."

At the beginning of the school year, the district identified 150 students who hadn't even logged in... a system of teachers, student coordinators, councilors and administrators reached out to those students and families to find out why... and find solutions.

"every student who is not going to school has a different need and we need to find what the barrier is."

"chris standup: that barrier could be anything-- internet or childcare issues, homelessness or mental health.

But once the district finds that barrier, they can find a fix."

Teams at the school level reached out to students absent five or more days 2,241 times by mid- november.

In that same time, district teams reached out to 15 students who hadn't attended 30 days or more, connecting those families to resources "we're flying a plane as we are building it, and everyone is patient and giving us grace."

It's a holistic approach embraced by districts statewide, including bethel in west eugene.

"is working.

For the vast majority of students, its working.

And for those students who are not yet engaging, it raises a red flag for us."

At bethel-- 9 students had missed 30 days or more.... 38 students haven't logged in at all and were unable to be reached..

With no indication they transferred to another district.

Students engaging not at all, or not enough... administrators say identifying systemic barriers is essential.

"teachers are connecting with students.

Letting students know there is a caring adult waiting for them."

The springfield school district says having the infrastructure to address systemic issues has already helped beyond the pandemic.

"when we were navigating wildfires in our area, we had a lot of displaced families and that system really helped to quickly identify what the families' needs are and help them reengage if possible."

These strategies proving promising in a post-pandemic world.

"a horrible situation we've been navigating with the pandemic, but there's lots of opportunities to be learned."

While administrators learn valuable lessons-- it's still on teachers to bring it back to basics... "it turns into, 'ok, let's take a good hard look at what you're missing as far as the work goes and lets figure out what are the essential skills that you need.

This other stuff, let's forget about it."

A lesson learned... "really just trying to bring the humanity into this."

And a connection made.

In eugene, chris lueneburg