Black and Latino children are more than twice as likely to be absent from school as they were before the start of the coronavirus pandemic, in 2019. More than 25% of students missed at least 10% of the 2021-2022 school year, making them chronically absent, according to the most recent data available. Before the pandemic, only 15% of students missed that much school. According to this article: Millions of kids are missing weeks of school as attendance tanks across the US, Bianca Vazquez Toness, Associated Press, August 10, 2023 They are concerned this will not be good for these children's future. They cited a variety of reasons that might be causing this. Family finances, housing instability, illness, transportation issues, school staffing shortages (a lot of teachers who were terminated because they refused to get the coronavirus vaccine left and refuse to come back, afraid it could happen to their career again), increased anxiety and depression, bullying. Some students might simply have become accustomed to not attending school classrooms, after schools in some areas closed for an extended period during the pandemic. They also observed that schools seem to be more unwelcoming than they were before the pandemic began, with school workers on edge. Some teachers are noticing students seem more disconnected. related thread: Why fewer Americans are going to college
