Your donation will help us produce journalism like this. Please give today.

California attorney general calls for state actions to improve student attendance 

California Attorney General Kamala Harris on Wednesday called for the California Department of Education to take over a job that her office has done for the past four years: release an annual data analysis on chronic student absenteeism. The request came as part of a 10-point call for action included in her office’s latest attendance report, In School + On Track 2016. Harris said that, beginning as early as preschool, chronic absenteeism has emerged as an indicator of whether students will be able to read at grade level in 3rd grade. That, in turn, is a predictor of graduating from high school, obtaining employment, paying taxes and staying out of prison. The report found that in 2015-16 about 7 percent of K-5 students were chronically absent, which is defined as missing more than 10 percent of school days. By Jane Meredith Adams, EdSource

• When California schools call cops for small infractions, it disproportionally hurts minority students, civil rights study finds, Los Angeles Times
• California’s rural counties to face heaviest teacher retirement rates, EdSource
• Students don’t find this taste of politics all that appetizing, Pasadena Star-News
• K-12 gets scant attention in final debate: What education issues got ignored? EdWeek
• These states are spending less on education now than before the Great Recession, Washington Post
• Guidance counselors seeking guidance: Inside the movement to improve college advising, The 74
• Educators went to jail for cheating. What happened to the students? NPR