Chronic absenteeism numbers dip for third year; state launches special task force to address problem
Amid a statewide decline in students missing school, Illinois is launching a Chronic Absence Task Force to study strategies to further reduce chronic absenteeism across all grade levels, state education officials said.
Chronic absenteeism — defined as students missing 10% or more of the school year due to excused or unexcused absences — marked a third consecutive year of improvement since its pandemic-driven peak at 29.8% in 2022, officials said.
It fell to 25.4% in 2025, down 14.8% since 2022, according to the 2025 Illinois School Report Card data released Thursday.
Though it remains higher than pre-pandemic levels, chronic absenteeism has continued to decline for the third consecutive year, State Superintendent of Education Tony Sanders said.
Missing just two days of school per month for any reason “can translate into students having difficulty learning to read by the third grade, achieving in middle school, and graduating from high school,” according to research documented by Attendance Works.
“This is still going to have to be a focus for Illinois schools,” Sanders said. “That’s because if a kid is not in school, regardless of the reason, the child is not learning and that’s why it strongly correlates with academic success at every grade level and across all student groups across the state.”
Chronic absenteeism remained highest among high school students, at 41.5% statewide in 2025, while absenteeism among students in kindergarten showed the greatest improvement — down from 29% in 2024 to 26% in 2025, data shows.
“Creating welcoming school climates to ensure students feel supported, connected and ready to learn” is key as well as addressing “root causes such as stress, trauma, housing instability, transportation challenges and other barriers,” Sanders said.
The state’s new task force will include educators, school leaders, social workers and representatives from advocacy organizations who will “identify strategies, evidence-based practices and policies to help families, educators and schools reduce chronic absences,” Sanders said.
The group will make recommendations to the state education board by the end of 2027.
Among the districts with the highest chronic absenteeism rates are Maine Township High School District 207 at 33%, Round Lake Area Unit District 116 at 31.8%, Elgin Area School District U-46 at 31%, and DuPage High School District 88 at 30.9%.
At the state’s second-largest school district, chronic absenteeism has seen a four percentage-point decrease for two years in a row, said Matt Raimondi, director of assessment, accountability and student success for Elgin Area School District U-46.
“Our chronic absenteeism rate is still above the state average, but we’re making really large gains,” Raimondi said.
Contributing to that downward trend is the district’s Every Minute Matters attendance campaign.
“Every school has been actively doing proactive measures to get students in school and on time,” he said. “So it is all hands on deck to increase student attendance. And we’re seeing positive results from that.”
It takes an entire school community, including counselors, deans, administrators and teachers, to help identify students in need of support and provide services to keep them in school, says Angela Stallion, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction for Lake Zurich Community Unit District 95.
In District 95, chronic absenteeism numbers have been trending downward from a high of 19% in 2023. It significantly reduced in the 2023-24 school year — 9.5% — but went up slightly to 11.5% in 2024-25, data show.
“There’s been an increased amount of outreach to our families over the last couple years, when we started to notice that chronic absenteeism was at an area that we were not happy with,” Stallion said. “We have a multitiered system of support for students that help intervene, both academically, socially-emotionally, and part of that social-emotional piece would be student attendance.”