D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser said Tuesday she’s expanding an anti-truancy program to all public and charter schools in Wards 7 and 8 after the pilot program resulted in a 64% drop in children skipping school.
The pilot program said that figure comes from the 456 students who were truant during the first year of the program and fell to 162 students playing hooky by the end of the second year. Ten schools participated in the pilot’s second year.
In comparison, city officials said 86% of the D.C. Public Schools students who were truant in the 2024-25 academic year played hooky again in 2025-26.
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“Every day a student misses school is a day of opportunity lost. This expansion means more families will have the support they need to make every day count,” Ms. Bowser said in a statement. “Our Truancy Reduction Pilot Program is showing that when we meet students and their families where they are, we get results.”
The novel program addresses truant students by connecting them with the city’s Department of Human Services rather than referring the students to child welfare authorities or courts for missing class. Students are considered truant if they have 10 unexcused full-day absences in middle school or 15 in high school.
If a parent or guardian accepts the referral to DHS, officials will coordinate with the family about how to improve attendance.
That often involves teaching the students certain life and organization skills, such as waking up on time for class, or it could be helping parents struggling financially so they can be more present for their child.
Other students had legal issues that kept them away from school. An annual report about the program said a 15-year-old boy started receiving death threats after he was arrested in Virginia, and his younger brother was assaulted because of his connection to the criminal incident.
A case manager with DHS helped the boy’s family enroll him in a different public school so he would not be in danger.
The report also mentioned a 15-year-old Hispanic boy who became afraid to leave his house after his father was deported amid President Trump’s federal surge in the District.
Officials said they have the boy currently working with mental health personnel before they can fix his truancy issues.
“Early, personalized, family-centered intervention changes outcomes, and when our case managers sit down with a family and figure out what’s actually standing between a student and the classroom, we see real, measurable change,” DHS Director A.D. Rachel Pierre said in a statement.
The report about the pilot program’s second-year results said the top five reasons for students skipping school were listed as “Youth Sick”, “Struggling Academically,” “Struggling Behaviorally,” “School Reporting Issue” and “Social and Peer Challenges.”
Most parents listed “Youth Sick” as the primary reason for their child not being able to attend class.
A majority of those parents (58%) declined services because they argued they could solve the truancy issues without involving city officials, or that they did submit forms for excused absences that weren’t processed by the school, the report said.
In total, 63% of all referrals were from ninth- and 10th-grade students. An overwhelming majority of students who were referred for truancy issues are Black (93%), with boys and girls split almost evenly.
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