American schools have a chronic absentee problem

If showing up is half the battle, a lot of American schoolchildren are in trouble.

A new analysis of data collected by the Education Department’s Office of Civil Rights from the 2013-14 school year shows that more than 6.5 million students, or about 13 percent in grades K-12, missed 15 or more days of school.

The study revealed that instances of chronic absenteeism are found in almost every school district, but that half of the nation’s chronically absent students were found in just 4 percent of districts.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/american-schools-have-a-chronic-absentee-problem/2016/09/03/566e0b42-7063-11e6-9705-23e51a2f424d_story.html