Freese Elementary

Tardies and excessive absences have a serious impact on students’ growth and achievement. It is extremely important for students to attend school every day and arrive on time.

Here is an excerpt from the San Diego Unified School District’s webpage:

“Common sense tells us that kids can’t learn in class if they aren’t there. Yet too little attention has been paid to the link between attendance and the dropout problem.

Very young children who are frequently absent miss lessons that form the foundation for later learning. Consequently, they may not become proficient readers. The cost is high: poor and minority children with chronic absences in grades 1-4 are at much greater risk of later truancy, academic failure and dropping out. 

Without a strong foundation, students often fall farther behind as they move up the grades. Catching up becomes more daunting if failures mount. By high school, students getting multiple Fs often show a pattern of skipping school because they’re giving up.”

We must improve attendance among Freese students!  See the chart below to see how attendance at school affects learning. Last year, Freese ended the year with a cumulative attendance rate of 95.35.  While this attendance rate may look strong, we must do better.  The chart below shows the strong correlation between attendance and achievement:

Good Attendence

We ask that all parents make sure students are on time and in school everyday for the full day unless the student is ill. Please note that checking your student out early without an approved reason is recorded as an unexcused absence.  

Be assured that whenever students miss school, they are missing vital curriculum.  The more students miss, the more likely they are to develop “holes” in their learning that hinder their academic progress.   Students with poor attendance may be referred to the School Attendance Review Board (SARB). For more information about attendance, see the following websites:

http://www.sandi.net/programs/everydaycounts/index.html

http://www.sandi.net/depts/sarb/

http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/ai/tr/

Absences

Parents should follow these procedures when their child is ill: 

Call school at 619-479-2727 to let us the nature of the student’s illness.

If illness will cause your child to miss school more than 5 days, ask the teacher or office for information about a Contract for Independent Study.

Contact the teacher to see if there is work that can be made up from the absence. 

We are asking all parents to schedule medical and dental appointments outside the school day unless the child is ill.  Trips that cause students to be absent from school are strongly discouraged.

Freese Attendance Incentives in 2009-10

We are striving to improve attendance at Freese!  We encourage every student to come to school everyday unless he/she is sick.  We also encourage every student to be on time and stay at school the whole day until dismissal time.  We will do our part to make every minute of the school day valuable for the education of your child.  The following incentives will be in place in 2009-2010 to encourage maximum attendance among students:

Monthly Attendance Certificate for students achieving perfect attendance.  Perfect attendance means the student is at school every day of the month, on time and present for the entire school day. (No tardies and no early check outs)

Recognition at Awards Assemblies

When available, award certificates to local restaurants and attractions will be issued to students with perfect attencance.