{"id":13659,"date":"2020-11-13T08:49:24","date_gmt":"2020-11-13T13:49:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aurora-institute.org\/?post_type=news_post&p=13659"},"modified":"2020-11-13T08:49:24","modified_gmt":"2020-11-13T13:49:24","slug":"how-can-states-and-districts-define-what-counts-as-attendance-during-remote-learning","status":"publish","type":"news_post","link":"https:\/\/aurora-institute.org\/news\/how-can-states-and-districts-define-what-counts-as-attendance-during-remote-learning\/","title":{"rendered":"How Can States and Districts Define What Counts as Attendance During Remote Learning?"},"content":{"rendered":"

New Aurora Institute Issue Brief Offers Examples and Analysis of Flexible Attendance Policies in K-12 Education<\/em><\/h4>\n

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WASHINGTON, D.C., November 13, 2020\u2014An analysis by the Aurora Institute (@Aurora_Inst<\/a>) has yielded recommendations for how states can allow more flexibility in how schools and districts determine what attendance means in the COVID-19 era of remote learning.<\/p>\n

The national nonprofit announced the publication of an issue brief, Determining Attendance and Alternatives to Seat-Time<\/em><\/a>, today at its National Policy Forum, an invite-only gathering of more than 160 state education policymakers.<\/p>\n

Attendance policies in K-12 education have long relied on policies like how much time students spend in their seats in a classroom, or whether they are in the line of sight of their instructor.<\/p>\n

\u201cCOVID-19, however, laid bare the massive fault lines in using this logic for attendance policies, which hail from a bygone industrial era,\u201d said Susan Patrick, President and CEO of the Aurora Institute.\u00a0 \u201cEven without COVID-19, students in innovative educational settings were learning at internships, at work, in their communities, and in many other ways and at many other places besides the traditional classroom. This issue brief is to help support states in aligning their attendance policies with broader definitions of attendance that decouple it from time and place and free students to learn anytime, anywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

The new issue brief calls on states to allow districts more flexibility in creating attendance policies, especially so that they may focus more on whether students are learning, not just whether they\u2019ve logged in. Specifically, the brief advises using:<\/p>\n