Each single prior-year absence is associated with a .010 to .016 SD decrease in fall mathematics starting achievement the following year¶
Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · associationalr2·q3·i1small
Currency · newest study 2020 · checked against its sources 2026-10-20 (automated, 1 of 1 entry) · not reviewed by a person
Subclaims¶
Reading the evidence codes
q is the design tier, i the impact, n the sample, and the kind with its r
the rigour judged within that kind: what each code means.
This claim: no standardized effect is recorded in observations/ for it yet, so no benchmark reading is possible.
q3 i1 Treating absences continuously, each prior-year absence predicted a small but cumulative decline in next-fall math achievement. → King 2020
Evidence¶
King 2020¶
King, G., & Jensen, N. (2020). Looking Back: How Prior-Year Attendance Impacts Starting Achievement. (The Center for School and Student Progress at NWEA Working Paper). https://www.nwea.org/research/publication/looking-back-how-prior-year-attendance-impacts-starting-achievement/
q3 · i1 · associational · r2
Equation 2 models fall-to-fall growth with lagged absences as a continuous variable, run overall and by grade and subject with school-clustered standard errors. Per-absence effect sizes were ".010 to .016 SDs" in math; the article illustrates an 18-day absent 4th grader declining .27 SD.
"In mathematics, a single absence was associated with a decrease in starting achievement of between .010 to .016 SDs (see Table 5)."
Discussion¶
Related Claims¶
- Low attendance is linked with lower academic skills, grades, and high school graduation, and high attendance with higher ones — the general claim this finding bears on, with the studies behind it
- Descriptively, prior-year chronically absent students achieved over half a standard deviation below their peers at the start of the following year — related
- Students highly absent (5-9.9% of days) in the prior year, below the chronic threshold, start the next year .14 to .22 SDs lower in mathematics than no-absence peers — related
- Even moderately absent students (0.1-4.9% of days) start the following year at significantly lower mathematics achievement (.07 to .15 SDs) than no-absence peers — a narrower finding that bears on this claim
- Students chronically absent (10%+) in the prior year start the following school year 0.22 to 0.47 SDs lower in mathematics than peers with no prior-year absences — a broader claim this one bears on
- Prior-year absence effects on starting achievement are much smaller in reading than mathematics and non-significant in most grade levels — related
Page metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
type |
claim |
id |
single-absence-cumulative-fall-math-decline |
title |
Each single prior-year absence is associated with a .010 to .016 SD decrease in fall mathematics starting achievement the following year |
description |
Each single prior-year absence is associated with a .010 to .016 SD decrease in fall mathematics starting achievement the following year |
status |
review |
evidence_strength |
moderate |
newest_evidence |
2020 |
source_checked |
2026-10-20 |
generated |
by process:wiki-ingest on 2026-10-08 |
trust |
unverified — no one has confirmed this page's content |
sources |
1 — king-2020 |
Frontmatter is the page's machine-readable record — see the Schema & Guide.