Typologizing Truancy Policy: A Cross-State Critical Analysis of Truancy Policies Using Mixed Methods

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Saturday 11:40 am Four Seasons Ballroom 4
  In Roundtable Session: New Research on Attendance, Truancy, and Absenteeism (Table 11)

Abstract

We apply critical policy approaches to analyze more than 40 state truancy policies (and related compulsory attendance policies) and administrative data from the Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC) and the Stanford Education Data Archive (SEDA). We use these data to explore how truancy policy rhetoric may reinforce or challenge racial inequality in school attendance and related outcomes. More specifically, we will examine the logics embedded in state truancy policies, develop a typology of various elements of state truancy policies, and assess whether this typology predicts racial inequality in student attendance, academic achievement, and exclusionary discipline outcomes.

Authors

• Ericka S. Weathers, University of Pennsylvania

• David Loeb, University of Pennsylvania

• Rebecca Rock, American Educational Research Association