Chief Justice Sharon L. Kennedy inspires students, School attendance leads to success.

Chief Justice Sharon L. Kennedy inspires students, School attendance leads to success.

Columbus City Preparatory School for Girls hosted visiting dignitaries and the kickoff of a program to encourage students to get to school every day, to “Stay in the Game”.

Chief Justice Sharon L. Kennedy of the Supreme Court of Ohio was among state and local leaders, and professional players from the Columbus Crew, that encouraged students to celebrate their attendance success and keep up the good work.

Ohio is focused on reducing truancy and increasing attendance in schools across the state through the Ohio Attendance Task Force. The task force is a partnership between state leaders, schools, sports organizations and businesses and non-profit organizations, working together to encourage students and parents to improve school attendance and reduce chronic absenteeism.

Ohio has a school attendance crisis. More than 615,000 students across the state have missed at least 10% of learning time and that quickly puts them behind in reading and math as well as other graduation requirements.

Ohio Law requires schools and districts to notify families when students are habitually truant or absent from school. Where the parent or guardian cannot get the student to school regularly, sometimes young people and families end up in the justice system.

Catching the problem early and identifying any underlying problems can get kids back in school and on target with their learning. Common barriers to school attendance are the lack of food, clothing or stable housing, lack of transportation, chronic illness of the child or family member, or fear of safety at school.

The Supreme Court of Ohio has a toolkit for schools and courts, Developing an Effective School Attendance Program. In partnership with the Ohio Department of Education, the toolkit identifies promising practices from public and private partnerships around the state. The main lesson from the success stories is that community partners can work together to remove the barriers and encourage attendance. In some cases, supportive services for the whole family are needed for kids to succeed.

Sports brings communities together and gives kids a healthy outlet and a way to stay engaged in learning and building a productive, healthy lifestyle.

The Crew has installed soccer pitches at Columbus City Schools and teaches soccer skills to students in the schools at little or no cost to regularly reward students for attendance.

“Stay in the Game” is program started in the Cleveland area and now has 45 partner school districts across the state. Led by Haslam Sports Group to reduce absenteeism, the program brings leaders from Ohio sports teams to the schools to meet and motivate kids.

During the 2022-2023 school year, the chronic absenteeism rate in Ohio decreased by 3.4 percent compared to 2021-2022 while Stay in the Game! partner districts outperformed statewide numbers. In total, the partner districts lowered their combined chronic absenteeism by 5.2 percent, with seven individual districts declining 8.5-10.9 percent year over year.