State data show 24% of Arizona students in grades 1-8 were chronically absent in 2025, down from a high of 32% in 2022 but still above pre-pandemic levels1,2.
A Helios Education Foundation and WestEd analysis of state data found 29% of students in grades 1-8 chronically absent in 2022-23, down from a peak of 34% in 2021-22 but still more than double pre-pandemic rates3.
High school rates are higher: 34% of high school students were chronically absent in 2023-24, down from a peak of 42% in 2021-22 and still about 10 percentage points above pre-pandemic levels4.
In high school in 2023-24, rates were 53% for American Indian or Alaska Native students, 47% for English language learners and 43% for economically disadvantaged students; high-poverty schools reported 40%, compared with 25% in lower-poverty schools4.
In 2025, the state superintendent's office cited Helios figures of 28.1% for grades 1-8 and 37% for grades 9-12, without naming a school year5.
No official all-grades Arizona rate was found to set beside the US rate of 22.6% in 2024-259; a statewide task force convened in 2023 has recommended filling gaps in attendance data by grade and subgroup, including high school1.
Requirements by role
What state rules ask of each role
Teachers
State law defines truant as an unexcused absence for at least one class period during the day11.
A truant child who is truant for at least five school days within a school year is habitually truant11.
Counselors
The state education department must identify an absence due to a student's mental or behavioral health as an excused absence, and it may adopt guidelines and rules on what counts as one15.
A person is excused from the compulsory attendance duties if it is shown to the satisfaction of the principal or the principal's designee that the child is in such physical or mental condition that instruction is inexpedient or impracticable10.
Other grounds the principal or designee may accept include reasons for nonattendance that satisfy them (the designee may be the district governing board), a child over fourteen employed at a lawful wage-earning occupation with the custodian's consent, and enrollment in a work training, career and technical education or vocational program that meets state education department standards10.
Attendance team
If a student in kindergarten or grades one through eight is absent without excuse, or without notice to the school that the parent or custodian authorized the absence, the school must make a reasonable effort to promptly telephone and notify the parent or custodian: within two hours after the first missed class for kindergarten through grade six; for grades seven and eight, within two hours if the first missed class is the first class of the day, or within five hours if it is later in the day15.
A school district, its governing board members and its employees or agents are not liable for failing to give this absence notice15.
A child who is habitually truant or has excessive absences may be adjudicated an incorrigible child; absences may be considered excessive when absent days exceed ten per cent of the required attendance days, which are the full time school is in session (for year-round schools, sessions totaling not less than one hundred eighty or two hundred school days, as applicable, or the equivalent as approved by the superintendent of public instruction)11,10.
A district's governing board may appoint an attendance officer, who may enforce attendance law for children ages six to sixteen, issue citations to appear in court, and report violations to local law enforcement and request an investigation; a citation to a child under eighteen must require the parent or custodian to appear with the child, and the officer must notify the parent that it was issued12,13.
Unless exempted, a parent or custodian of a child between six and sixteen who does not homeschool the child, and who fails to enroll the child or ensure the child attends a public, private or charter school, or fails to sign an empowerment scholarship account contract, is guilty of a class 3 misdemeanor10.
Principals & districts
School districts and charter schools must report student absence data to the state education department at least once every sixty days in session16.
For average daily membership, a student absent for ten consecutive school days counts as a withdrawal, except for excused absences identified by the state education department; a student absent nine or fewer consecutive school days, including the last day of the school year, is not a withdrawal, and a withdrawal dates back to the last day of actual attendance or excused absence16.
On or before enrolling a student in kindergarten or grades one through eight, the school district must tell the parent or custodian that they are responsible for authorizing any absence and notifying the school in advance or at the time of the absence, and that the district requires at least one telephone number, if available, given at enrollment, with prompt notice of any change15.
Each district governing board and charter school governing body must adopt a policy on excusing students for religious purposes; the policy may permit such absences, and if it does, its conditions must include at least the custodian's written consent and that any religious instruction or exercise takes place at a suitable place away from school property designated by the church or religious denomination or group14.
Recent changes
What changed lately
In 2025, the state superintendent urged schools to adopt measures under which nine unexcused absences result in a student failing a course and five tardies count as an absence, and asked law enforcement to be willing to issue truancy citations; these are calls to act, not new law8.
Accountability
How the state holds schools to it
In Arizona's A-F school letter grades, schools currently earn points for reducing chronic absence if their year-over-year chronic absence rate for grades 1-8 stayed the same or decreased by any amount, according to a statewide task force1.
That task force has recommended updating the A-F chronic absence metric; A-F policies are subject to final adoption by the State Board of Education1.
The state's accountability measure counts a student as chronically absent when absent from a given school for any reason, excused or unexcused, more than 10 percent of the school's calendar year6.
That definition does not fully account for students who change schools; in 2022-23, the rate among mobile 8th graders reached 55%7,3.
The task force, convened in 2023, also recommended a goal to reduce chronic absence to pre-pandemic levels by 2030 and revisiting the definition to account for student mobility1.
What’s working
Efforts with results
The Tolleson Elementary School District ran a "2 Days Is Too Much" campaign to teach families how missed school affects learning, using social media, flyers and home visits; KJZZ reports the district's chronic absenteeism fell 12 percentage points from 2024-25 to 2025-262.
Working on chronic absence in Arizona?
Agenteach helps counselors, teachers, and attendance teams follow up with students who are missing school, and keeps a record of every step.
