Every School Day Matters! Attendance Campaign

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Want to learn why attendance matters for your student and what you can do to support them?

• Elementary Handout in English
• Elementary Handout in Spanish
• Middle/High Handout in English
• Middle/High Handout in Spanish

• Statewide attendance data
• Colorado school district websites

Using attendance data help us better understand when students are starting to disengage and how we can best organize our responses.

• Missing only two-three days a month can add up to missing a full month of school by the end of the year and impact student learning
• When large percentages of students miss school, it can impact all students in a classroom, even those who attend regularly
• In Colorado, about one of every four students was chronically absent, impacting a large number of schools and districts
• Schools and Districts have made progress reducing absences but more students are missing school than pre-pandemic

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• Statewide attendance data: CDE publishes spreadsheets that can be used to examine school, district, or state attendance data.
• Attendance goal calculator: This interactive dashboard can be filtered by school, district and student groups and shows progress in chronic absenteeism over the past three years.
• Early Warning Systems:  Attendance is an early predictor of student's engagement and long-term outcomes.  Early Warning Systems are an evidence based strategy for regular review and response to student level data that can improve student engagement and remove barriers to learning.

For all templates Navigate to the File menu and select “Make a Copy” to create editable versions where you can add district and school specific resources and messaging.

• Statewide attendance data
• "How sick is too sick?" guidance from the Colorado Department of Public Health
• Sample attendance materials from Colorado school districts
• CDE's 2025-2026 school year attendance calendar:
  • Attendance Calendar template in English and Spanish

• Communicating regularly with students and families about attendance
• Recognizing and rewarding good attendance habits
• Creating supportive and welcoming learning environments
• Monitoring student attendance and intervening before students become chronically absent

2024-25 summary: This provides a 2 page overview of the trends in attendance data from 2024-25.

Attendance best practices and resources: CDE compiled information on effective practices to impact attendance.

CDE Attendance Guidebook - July 2026: This guidebook provides an overview of key information about attendance including state policy and an overview of recommended approaches to improving attendance.

• Learning cohorts - District leaders share their experience with learning cohorts
• CDE Attendance Learning 25-26 (PDF)

Join the challenge to reduce Chronic Absenteeism by 50%