Arizona’s public schools superintendent is worried about the state’s chronic absenteeism rate. Research from the Helios Education Foundation earlier this year found the rate at 29% among first through eighth graders during the 2022-23 school year; chronic absenteeism is defined as missing 10% or more of the school year, or 18 days in a typical 180-day school year.
So to try to bring the rate down, Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne is encouraging school districts to enact a policy that would fail a student for nine unexcused absences. He’s also calling for districts and police departments to more strongly enforce truancy laws.
Horne joined The Show to discuss what he’d like to see happen as far as bringing in law enforcement to get more students to show up at school.
Full conversation
TOM HORNE: Sure the main message wasn't so much law enforcement as it was. I would like other districts to copy the district that has policies that have worked very well, which include what I've been advocating for some time, which is to bring back the old method, which is that nine absences, and you don't get credit for the course. And it's tough but we need something tough.
The reason is that parents have the most influence on the children as to whether they get them to school or not. And I think it was during COVID that they got in the habit that they don't necessarily need to go to school, and so we're seeing it being much more lax.
The number of students who were absent 18 days or more before COVID was 9%. Now it's about 30% so that's become a really serious problem. You cannot teach children that are not there. And parents want their kids to pass their courses. They want them to graduate on time, and I think that's most effective. And this district that we featured.
MARK BRODIE: Dysart, I think right?
HORNE: Dysart, yeah. At Dysart, they've instituted that again, and it's been extremely successful for them. You know, we're a local control state, so I can't force it.
I'm trying to influence districts to implement policies like that, because when they have lax policies on attendance, and some of them also have lax policies on on holding kids back, a couple of teachers came to me to complain that the kids were going from one grade to another without being able to read and the and they really should be held back, but the the school board had said they don't like the idea of holding kids back. That's a very, very bad policy.
So so I'm urging that policy now, in addition to that, these teachers that complained to me said that their police officer had turned in to the city attorney cases that should be prosecuted, and the city attorney hadn't gotten to it, and so I'm urging city attorneys to be more you know, give a higher priority to truancy cases.
BRODIE: So am I understanding you correctly that you are not opposed to, for example, parents facing consequences for their kids not being in school?
HORNE: I'm totally in favor of it, because they have the most influence on the kids getting to school.
BRODIE: I'm wondering if you see any parallels between this kind of policy that you're advocating for, in terms of a student failing a class if they miss a certain number of days, and the policies that some places have implemented where if kids miss too many days, they're suspended from school.
I just wonder if there's, if there any similarities in terms of creating a disincentive to for kids to go to school, like, why bother if I'm just going to fail anyway, or if I've already failed the class after, you know, a certain number of absences, why bother showing up for the rest of the year? That kind of thing.
HORNE: Yeah, I'm not sure suspension is the solution, because that just makes the kids stay home more. I think the solution is not getting credit. Which is, which is what Dysart does.
And the reason that is effective for them, and I believe would be effective throughout the state, is because the parents want the kids to graduate on time, if the school just passes kids along, no matter how much they're absent, no matter how little they learn, they don't have the incentive. The parents don't have as much incentive. Many parents do, obviously, but some don't have the incentive to make sure the kids go to school.
BRODIE: So in your mind, like, how would it look in terms of finding truancy cases. Like, do you envision either city police departments or maybe the county sheriffs, or maybe even schools hiring truancy officers to go look for parents and kids, or is it just if they come upon somebody and they realize that that's what it is, then they bring that case forward? Like, how do you envision it working?
HORNE: Well, some districts do have truancy officers and and that those were the teachers who came to me to complain because the truancy officer did his job, but the city attorneys were taking forever to get to it if they ever did get to it, but, but the main message on law enforcement is that every police officer has the same powers as a truancy officer has, so they need to be watch, watching out, and When they see a kid hanging out instead of being in school, they need to inquire.
BRODIE: I'd like to ask if I might talk about another issue that I know that you're very involved with, that is the potential elimination of the U.S. Education Department.
I know that this is something that you are in favor of. I think the line you use or something about that, if they actually do it, you'll throw a party to celebrate the U.S. Education Department going away.
HORNE: I actually, the way I describe it, I say, Well, if they destroy the federal department, the first thing that will happen, and people are expecting me to complain or something, I say, the first thing that happened is, I'll throw a party.
BRODIE: OK, so I'm wondering if you know, as this talk has started, and as some of the work. Work has started. You know, some staffers have been let go, and some of you know, the work of what the Department of Education, the Federal version, is doing, has started to be migrated to other places.
I'm curious how that's going for your department, in terms of, like, just keeping up with some of the changes that are happening in D.C.
HORNE: Well, we haven't noticed anything, but, there's a much bigger issue, and that is, we already monitor schools. I have 600 people here who know a lot about Arizona schools.
In Washington, D.C., you have people in an ivory tower. They don't really know what's going on here, but they're my we're monitoring the schools and they're monitoring us, and that's two agencies doing the same thing that one agency can do.
And the big thing in my mind is, first of all, it would be done better by our department, because people here know what's going on in Arizona schools.
But secondly, I want to be sure that everything is efficient enough so we can have more money to pay our teachers. We absolutely have to be paying our teachers more. We are now losing more teachers from the profession that are coming into the classroom. If everything could be more efficient, and we would have the benefit of the savings of eliminating that huge department, I would want to put it into increasing teacher salaries.
BRODIE: Do you have any measure of confidence that if the U.S. Education Department goes away, that means more money, specifically to Arizona, that could be used for teacher salaries?
HORNE: I don’t know. It's a hope, but I don't have they just haven't come out with enough details to know that we have brought to their attention that if they are giving the power to the states, it should be to the state superintendents and not to, you know, the governor or some, some other place, because we have 600 people who do nothing but education, that the governor has three or four, the attorney general has none.
So, we're lobbying for that, but there's no way to predict it until they start coming out with more details.
BRODIE: OK, I'm wondering if any of your staffers have run into an issue where somebody with whom they work in D.C. on whatever program it is or whatever grant or funding stream or whatever it is, that person has been let go, and the person in your office doesn't know to whom they should be reaching out with a question or a concern or anything like that?
HORNE: If that were to happen, I think I would find out about it. And it hasn't happened to date. Doesn't mean it might not happen in the future, but it has not happened to date.
BRODIE: Is that a concern of yours?
HORNE: If it happens, it'll depend on the details. So you know, I'm not sure whether it'll be a significantly negative thing or not until I know exactly what's happening.
