UPPER ARLINGTON SCHOOLS
1950 N. Mallway Drive  |  Upper Arlington, Ohio 43221  |  (614) 487-5000

School Attendance Information

The Upper Arlington School District believes that regular daily attendance is vital to student academic success.  A new attendance law went into effect in Ohio called House Bill 410, and we want to share how this law impacts changes in our attendance policy.  

What is House Bill 410? 
Schools must now track time missed from school by hours and minutes as opposed to days missed.  There will be no more half-day absences.  All absences will fall into some category of partial or full day missed.  

Definitions:
●	Habitual Truancy - any student absent without a legitimate excuse (see hours below)
●	Excessive Absence - any student absent with or without a legitimate excuse (see hours below)

	Consecutive Hours	Hours in a School Month	Hours in a School Year	
Habitual Truancy	30+ hours unexcused 
(About 5 days)	42+ hours unexcused (About 7 days)	72+ hours unexcused
(About 12 days)	
Excessive Absences		38+ hours excused or unexcused (About 6.5 days)	65+ hours excused or unexcused (About 11 days)	

What This Means
Not much changes in terms of truancy for those students who accumulate unexcused time out of school.  Numerous supports are in place to reach resolution with families before filing truancy charges. 

The main shift will be in the accumulation of excused and unexcused hours out of school for some students, under the Excessive Absences thresholds.  For example, students who have approved, pre-arranged absences that add up to the hours in the table above will now receive warnings and notifications from schools, per the State law.  We understand it may be confusing to send Excessive Absence letters for absences that have been excused, but  state law requires us to contact families when the thresholds above have been met.  

Reminders
●	Please remember there are ten (10) reasons in State law and Board policy that allow us to excuse an absence from school.  Please review the Student’s Rights and Responsibility Handbook, or Board Policy 5200.  
●	Parents may call their child off for illness without a doctor’s note up to ten (10) full days per school year, but a Principal may request a doctor’s note for any such absence.  
●	Planned absences will be counted as excused absences until the total hours missed from school equals 65 absent hours.  This total includes previous absence hours and planned absence hours.  After 65 hours have been missed, the planned absences shall count as unexcused absence(s).
●	Families are strongly urged to arrange planned absences only when it is an utmost necessity. 

Changes to Attendance Letters
Families will be notified in advance if a student is nearing the Habitually Truant threshold(s).  When a student meets or exceeds one of the attendance thresholds for Habitual Truancy, a letter will be sent and phone call made to families to arrange a required Absence Intervention Team meeting.  

When a student meets or exceeds one of the attendance thresholds for Excessive Absences, a letter will be sent home and phone call made to note the requirement for any additional absences to have a doctor’s note or other documentation to excuse the absence per Board policy.  

We look forward to working with families to maximize student attendance to support each student, every step of the way!

If you have any questions about attendance or House Bill 410, please contact Andy Hatton, Director of Academic Affairs at ahatton@uaschools.org.