SchoolStatus Improves Attendance Processes in Roseville City School District

District Overview

District: Roseville City School District
Size: 12,500 students
Products Used: SchoolStatus Attend
Location: California

Roseville City School District, a growing California district serving over 12,500 students in preschool through 8th grade, faced challenges with chronic absenteeism rising from 6% to 26% in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. The district lacked consistent, data-driven processes to monitor and support student attendance. By partnering with SchoolStatus and developing a robust communication campaign, Roseville City was able to transform its attendance intervention efforts, leading to significant improvements in overall attendance rates, a dramatic 62% reduction in chronic absenteeism over two years, and award recognition for the district.

The Challenge: Inconsistent Attendance Tracking and Support

According to Director of Educational Services Erin Peterson, Roseville City struggled with an ad-hoc, manual approach to attendance tracking and intervention. She explained, “Our process was inconsistent, and we were unable to intentionally support students based on data.” The district relied on monthly attendance reports generated by school clerical staff, which were very manual and became easily disrupted by clerical staff turnover. This made it difficult for school leaders to proactively identify and assist students at risk of chronic absenteeism.

“We had no way to be able to quickly at our fingertips see who hasn’t been at school. Who has been at school? What are their attendance trends? What are their attendance patterns? It was a robust process to work with our student management system to even figure out what, if any, trends a student had,” said Ms. Peterson. “You were just going by a report. And it was human-driven. Our clerical had to run a report every month. And if we had any clerical turnover, they didn’t know how to run that report. And so then maybe schools never sent letters. Or they only sent letters to those students that they noticed had really high chronic attendance patterns.” This manual process led to inconsistency from school to school and a reactive focus only on the most absent students as school staff had to make choices based on the amount of time they had for tasks.

The lack of a centralized, data-driven attendance tracking system also contributed to inconsistencies in the district’s communication and support for families. As Jessica Hull, Executive Director of Communication and Community Engagement, noted, “I thought we were going to have 99% attendance when we came back. And it was actually the opposite because sentiments changed during that time. It was hard to get those families back. Nobody knew when they could come back. Can I come with a cough? I don’t know what’s safe. People didn’t know that we were prioritizing attendance again.” 

The Solution: SchoolStatus Attend Interventions and Consistent Communication Campaigns

Recognizing the need for a more proactive, data-driven approach to attendance, Roseville City Schools partnered with SchoolStatus to implement data dashboards and automated intervention letters. The SchoolStatus Attend platform provided the district with the tools and insights necessary to effectively monitor student attendance, identify at-risk students, and deliver targeted support to families.

“It’s created a space where we’re having the right conversations about attendance, whereas before it used to be, how do you run this report and what does this mean? Where now the conversations have become about whether there are any additional resources and how do we support this family? It’s really shifted that focus from the technical side of attendance to the right conversations around supporting families,” said Ms. Peterson.

The integration of SchoolStatus Attend also enabled Roseville to take a more proactive and data-driven approach to communication. As Ms. Hull explained, “The data helps us in so many ways. And so, we can do a lot of this work because we have the data behind it that helps to inform it. We’re making really educated moves because of having that data.”

The district leveraged the data and insights from SchoolStatus Attend to power its comprehensive “Every Day Matters” attendance campaign, which included targeted outreach, communication, and support for families. The campaign was built around informing families and staff about how sick is too sick, encouraging students to return to school, and consistently informing the community of a renewed focus on daily attendance for all students. As Ms. Hull explained, “We did a lot of informational outreach shared through our home-to-school, school-to-home communication system and through social media and our website about those facts that you might not think about. That every day does matter and that missed days do add up.” 

This holistic approach, combining data-driven intervention and strategic communication, proved highly effective in driving improvements in attendance. According to Ms. Hull, “What we’re looking at now is utilizing the data to inform the campaign. Our TK (Transitional Kindergarten) through One grade levels, our Seven and Eight grade levels, they’re chronically absent for different reasons and so we need to continue the campaign as a whole for all pre-K-8 but also have tailored specific messages for those communities.”

Measurable Results: Dramatic Improvements in Attendance and Chronic Absenteeism 

Roseville City Schools’ partnership with SchoolStatus Attend yielded significant, measurable improvements in average daily attendance (ADA) and chronic absenteeism in its first two years:

As Ms. Hull noted, “We’ve seen an over 50% decrease, which is the statewide goal. We’re already there, in just one year of work. And I think if we continue to focus, we’ll see even better results in the coming years.”

Roseville City recently had twenty of their schools recognized by the State of California for implementing Positive Behavior Interventions and Support (PBIS), their work with SchoolStatus Attend was a part of that recognition alongside the work that schools did to create and foster positive environments on their campuses. 

Ms. Hull shared, “I think one of the main pieces is that every single staff member is dedicated to this work. Not just the PBIS work but the attendance work. It’s a focus of every conversation that we have and so it’s really a commitment by over 1,300 people to make these changes.”

Ms. Peterson also credits the dedication of the staff as critical to the district’s success, “None of this would be possible without our incredible staff. They are willing to learn, they’re willing to dive in, they’re willing to support families every day. Our teams have worked incredibly hard to ensure we’re wrapping around families and giving them everything that they need to support their children with getting to school, as well as learning at school every day.”

Conclusion: SchoolStatus Provides a Partnership for Attendance Success

The partnership between Roseville City Schools and SchoolStatus Attend has been transformative, enabling the district to transition from an inconsistent, manual approach for attendance letters to a data-driven, proactive model of intervention and support. By integrating SchoolStatus Attend, Roseville City has been able to dramatically improve overall attendance rates, reduce chronic absenteeism, and shift the focus of their attendance efforts from technical processes to meaningful, data-informed individual support for students and families.

Ms. Hull summarized the importance of SchoolStatus Attend to her work, “We need to tell everyone all the time that attendance is important. And that’s the big thing that COVID did change for all of us—that somehow it wasn’t important. And if you don’t have a system like SchoolStatus Attend to constantly remind people…we can’t send a message every time someone’s absent. But a program like this does continue to message that consistently. And without that, I think you’re really struggling to find the time to give those messages on a consistent basis.”

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