Putnam City Schools Working To Increase Attendance, Combat Absenteeism

A new initiative at Putnam City Public Schools is hoping to help students not only be in attendance, but also be punctual with their work.

The district says it is excited to see an increase in student attendance this year, but now plans to keep students in the classroom and decrease absenteeism.

Putnam City Schools director of communications AJ Graffeo said

“We officially started the be present be bold last spring when we did the first round of changes to the policy district wide," Putnam City Schools director of communications AJ Graffeo said. "Since May, we’ve seen a 5% increase in our daily student attendance, and so conversely, a 5% decrease in our chronic absenteeism, which is huge."

Teachers say thanks to this change, they have also seen saw an increase in positive grades.

“A lot of our learning is collaborative, so if the students are going to collaborate with each other in order to learn, they have to be here," Central Elementary School 3rd Grade teacher Sarah Tabor said.

Additionally, another teacher at Central Elementary said when students are not in attendance, they miss communicating with other students about the subject material.

"They miss out on those conversations where they can learn from other students, and take part in those group dialogues that helps their learning a lot," 3rd grade teacher Emma Miller said.

Classes at Putnam City Schools begin at 8 a.m. on Wednesday.