The issue of attendance is also affecting Hillcrest High School students as well. Chronic absenteeism is what’s called when you miss 10% or more of your school year. This issue has since doubled since the pandemic. According to edpost.com “Before 2020, 15% of students nationwide were chronically absent, by 2021-2022 the number skyrocketed to 28%.” Showing that this is becoming not just a Hillcrest problem but a national problem.

There is a reason the students that do the announcements tell you about the prizes you win if you don’t miss too many days. Even the staff and teachers are noticing the major increase in absences from 2019-2025. Hillcrest teacher Mrs.Pointer has noticed the major increase in absences from the years 2019-2025: “I have noticed a major difference in attendance over the years, I believe it’s because of how COVID took us out of school for a while. But it’s crazy I used to have way better attendance before all that COVID stuff hit.”

Staff and teachers want us to come to school, but the students themselves need to come to school for our own academic sake.

So the real question is: why is it that nobody feels like going to school?

There’s a couple of reasons why. It could be because of how our school assimilated after the COVID pandemic. It could also be more personal issues like mental health issues, domestic home issues, as well as transportation problems preventing good attendance. The violence that has taken place in these halls has contributed to making students feel unsafe and not wanting to come to school. Even the bullying issues students face could have an impact. In this newspaper article, we will discuss these reasons behind the major absence and how we can fix it.

For instance, a large amount of absences can be because of social anxiety or other mental health issues. A way we could try to lessen absences when it comes to mental health is trying to make sure classes are accommodating. Individuals with mental health issues just need someone to be understanding of the bad and good days. So this could make them more motivated to come to school with less pressure and anxiety. Hillcrest has done a great job with this. The attendance committee has helped with being more inclusive. They have also implemented little gifts, prizes, and incentives that have helped with good attendance. Personally, as a student, I’ve seen way better attendance when we receive incentive for it.

Transportation can also be a big issue for attendance for Hillcrest. A lot of students rely on their parents to take them to school. But it can be hard when your parents oversleep, do not have a car, have other responsibilities. One way I believe could help with this is having more buses go different routes so regardless of location, students could have a ride.

Another issue could be that students have bad sleep schedules making them constantly late and therefore having bad attendance. A possible solution could be replacing the half days that end at 11:45 with having students come late instead of leaving early. Some schools have implemented this already. Such as Township High School District 211 in Palatine, Illinois. Several times a year a time is set aside for faculty in-services. On these days they start school at 9 am instead of 7 / 8 am. Students still attend all classes but the length of each class is shortened like an early release day.

According to charliehealth.com about 42% of Genz is struggling with mental health. Which is a main contributing factor for some people’s attendance. We can’t blame all of attendance issues on mental illness. But we can’t ignore it when there has been a mental health crisis going on with Gen Z for a while. Along with school, it can make these individuals feel burnt out and hopeless. School attendance is important but so is mental health. Hillcrest staff and students have seen this and started trying to better this problem. Such as when we had therapy dogs come to the library. I’ve seen students that I’ve never even seen crack a smile and have a ball with these dogs. Everyone wanted to come to school to see the therapy dogs! They were even wandering the halls making students feel comfort and joy in these service animals.

The last reason that could be a reason behind the major decrease in attendance is because of how we as a society have assimilated since COVID. According to Notre Dame News, since the 2020 pandemic rates of chronic absenteeism have nearly doubled nationwide for students in kindergarten- grade 12. Furthermore, proving this is a nationwide problem and not just our school’s problem.

I also spoke to the person who is head of the attendance committee, Dean Teany. I asked him if he noticed a change in attendance since the pandemic. He answered “Yes COVID made students feel like attendance in school wasn’t a priority. Mostly due to how students didn’t have to actually be in person and make the effort to show up. They could just lay in bed and do the work from a laptop. Creating that disconnect for importance on actual in person attendance. I mean even then students didn’t even show up to the remote learning.” He also added further insight by telling me that they did surveys on why students didn’t feel/want to attend school. Some students answered that students said they felt unsafe in school. This was largely due to the violence that occurred in the past with Hillcrest.

The attendance committee has addressed these issues by fostering a stronger connection between students and the school. For example, during our Black History Month assembly, we were able to see people feel more connected to the school with this program. Between the band, majorette dance team, and masked singers, it really made students and staff proud and united as a school.

We have also seen a major decrease in violence at Hillcrest compared to previous years – making students feel more comfortable and safe to come to school. The deans have harsher punishment for fighting making the school more safe.

By putting these preventive measures forward we have seen a great increase in attendance from the previous year!