Inside the School’s Four Walls: Creating a Stronger Reason to Return

Most adults know what it feels like to work in a job that does not interest them.

You may still be capable of doing the work and understand what is expected of you. But when the work feels disconnected from anything that interests you, something can begin to change.

Enthusiasm fades. Participation becomes more limited. You stop volunteering ideas or taking initiative. You do what is required, but little more. You start watching the clock. You may begin arriving late, taking more time off, or eventually looking for another place to work.

Your ability did not necessarily change.

Your connection to the experience did.

That familiar adult experience may offer another way to think about some high school students who have already been identified as chronically absent.

A student may be fully capable of doing the academic work and still struggle to see a connection between the educational experience they encounter each day and anything that currently interests them.

For a chronically absent high school student, that lack of connection may contribute to continued disengagement. When present, the student may participate less, put forth less effort, feel less motivated to complete assignments, and see little reason to reconnect with an educational experience that does not feel relevant.

The attendance problem already exists.

The student is already chronically absent.

So, another question deserves our attention:

Could making the educational experience more relevant to what currently interests that student help create a stronger reason to return, engage, and participate more fully?

Chronic absenteeism is complex. Transportation, health concerns, family circumstances, mental health, school climate, safety, economic conditions, and other barriers can interfere with consistent attendance.

Engagement is not the most significant explanation for every chronically absent high school student.

But research suggests that engagement and students' experiences inside school deserve particular attention as students grow older.

RAND's research on chronic absenteeism has documented district leaders' concerns about disengagement and the need to make school more engaging and relevant, while recognizing that no single intervention will address every attendance barrier. [1]

The University of Chicago Consortium on School Research found that attendance in middle and high school was associated with aspects of school climate including relationships, connectedness, safety, and whether students found value and meaning in their classes. [2]

The Learning Policy Institute has also documented attendance strategies designed to strengthen student connectedness, including enrichment opportunities and activities incorporating student interests. [3]

Together, this research raises an important distinction:

Attendance data can tell us which students are chronically absent and how much school they are missing. It may not tell us enough about how those students are experiencing school.

That distinction becomes particularly important in high school.

Ninth grade may be one of the most important places to begin.

Research from the University of Chicago Consortium has shown that ninth-grade attendance and course performance matter for whether students remain on track for high school graduation. The transition into ninth grade can also bring changes in attendance and academic behavior, making early high-school support especially important. [4]

For a ninth-grade student who is already chronically absent, schools may therefore need to understand not only how much school the student is missing, but whether disengagement from the educational experience is contributing to those absences.

If it is, one of the next steps may be remarkably simple:

Ask what currently interests the student.

Not what adults think should interest them. Not what we expect them to choose as a career. Not what they may care about several years from now.

What captures their attention right now?

It may be basketball, fashion, gaming, music, cars, technology, cooking, social media, art, beauty, fitness, animals, entrepreneurship, construction, photography, healthcare, design, politics, movies, or something we would never discover unless we asked.

And those interests should not be treated as permanently fixed.

Longitudinal research following adolescents from grades 8 through 12 found both stability and developmental change in student interests over time. [5]

Secondary education frameworks also provide precedent for revisiting student information as students’ progress through school. Massachusetts' My Career and Academic Plan uses a multiyear process that includes recurring exploration of student interests, skills, talents, and experiences. [6] Colorado's Individual Career and Academic Plan similarly emphasizes a multiyear approach with meaningful participation and updates for every student, every year. [7]

These frameworks are not chronic absenteeism interventions, and they do not establish that annual interest assessments will improve attendance.

They do, however, support an important principle:

Because students continue to develop throughout high school, their interests should not be treated as information collected once and assumed to remain unchanged. Schools might begin by identifying a student's current interests in ninth grade and revisiting them each academic year, allowing the educational connections created for that student to evolve as the student does.

Once educators understand what currently interests a student, the next question becomes:

How can some of those interests be incorporated into the student's daily educational experience while maintaining academic standards and expectations?

A student interested in basketball still needs mathematics, but statistics, percentages, probability, and performance data may provide a different entry point into mathematical concepts.

A student interested in gaming may encounter mathematics, storytelling, technology, economics, design, or problem-solving through examples that already capture their attention.

While a student interested in fashion might encounter measurement, geometry, history, global supply chains, marketing, economics, or persuasive communication through a context that already feels familiar.

The academic standard does not have to change.

The connection to the academic standard can.

The goal is not to reduce rigor or create a separate curriculum for every student. It is to find meaningful ways to connect required learning with something that already captures the student's attention.

Those connections may make learning feel more relevant.

Relevance may encourage engagement.

Engagement may strengthen motivation.

When disengagement and lack of motivation contribute to a high school student's chronic absenteeism, strengthening that connection may provide another reason to return and participate more fully.

Educational institutions are already working to address many of the external barriers associated with chronic absenteeism. Some of those circumstances are difficult for schools to influence directly.

But there is another place to look:

Inside the school's four walls.

Schools have influence over the educational experiences students encounter when they arrive.

For chronically absent high school students whose attendance challenges include disengagement and lack of motivation, that influence may provide an important opportunity.

Relevance alone will not solve chronic absenteeism.

But when disengagement is part of the problem, schools may have an opportunity to strengthen something they can influence:

the educational experience waiting for the student inside the school's four walls.

Sources

[1] Diliberti, Melissa Kay, Lisa Chu, Lydia R. Rainey, Samantha E. DiNicola, Robin J. Lake, and Heather L. Schwartz. RAND Corporation. Chronic Absenteeism Still a Struggle in 2024–2025: Selected Findings from the American School District Panel and the American Youth Panel. August 14, 2025. See also RAND's 2024 report, Districts Try with Limited Success to Reduce Chronic Absenteeism.

[2] Allensworth, Elaine M., Meril Antony, William Delgado, and Marisa de la Torre. University of Chicago Consortium on School Research. Connection, Trust, and Learning: Student Attendance in the Middle and High School Grades Following the COVID-19 Pandemic. January 2026.

[3] Learning Policy Institute. Reducing Chronic Absenteeism: Lessons From Community Schools. 2024.

[4] University of Chicago Consortium on School Research. Free to Fail or On-Track to College. September 2014; and Allensworth, Elaine M., and John Q. Easton. What Matters for Staying On-Track and Graduating in Chicago Public Schools. July 2007.

[5] Tracey, Terence J. G., Steven B. Robbins, and Christy D. Hofsess. Stability and Change in Interests: A Longitudinal Study of Adolescents from Grades 8 Through 12. Journal of Vocational Behavior, Vol. 66, No. 1, February 2005, pp. 1–25.

[6] Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. Guidance for the Development of a High Quality MyCAP Process and MyCAP High School Scope and Sequence.

[7] Colorado Department of Education. Individual Career and Academic Plan.