States / Florida

Chronic absence in Florida

Where things stand, what state rules ask of each role, and what is changing. For school and district leaders.

School year 2024-25

29%

of students were chronically absent¹

Chronically absent means miss 10 percent or more of the school year.¹

U.S. rate: 22.6% (2024-25)⁴

Five-year trend

Florida, year by year

Florida chronic absence by school year
School year	Chronically absent
2018-19	20%
2020-21	25.1%
2021-22	32.3%
2022-23	30.9%
2023-24	31%
2024-25	29%

Dashed bars mark years the state did not publish a rate.

Where things stand

The numbers

About 29% of Florida students were chronically absent in 2024-25, down from 31% the year before, in state-reported data compiled by AEI¹.
That is below the 2021-22 peak of 32.3% but well above the roughly 20% seen in 2018-19, the last school year before the pandemic^2,3.
A newspaper analysis found that nearly one million Florida students missed more than three weeks of school in a single year³.
High schools are hit hardest: 37% of high school students missed a large amount of school in 2023-24, up from less than a quarter before the pandemic. Rates also rose from 18% to 28% in elementary schools and from 18% to 31% in middle schools³.
At schools where most children live in poverty, about 35% of students miss school regularly, compared with 19% at schools where fewer than a quarter do³.
Nationally, 22.6% of students were chronically absent in 2024-25, well below Florida's 29%^4,1.

Requirements by role

What state rules ask of each role

Teachers

Attendance must be checked each school day, in the manner State Board of Education rules prescribe, and recorded in the teacher's register or another approved system⁵.
Students count as present only if they are at school, or away from school on a school day doing an educational activity that is part of their school-approved instructional program⁵.
If a student has at least five unexcused absences (or absences with unknown reasons) within a calendar month, or 10 within a 90-calendar-day period, the student's primary teacher must report to the principal or designee that the student may be showing a pattern of nonattendance⁶.
For an excused absence, as district policy defines it, the school must let the student make up assigned work without an academic penalty, unless the work is not made up within a reasonable time⁶.

Counselors

A student who turns 16 during the school year stops being subject to compulsory attendance only after filing a formal declaration of intent to leave school with the district school board. The declaration must be signed by the student and parent, and the district must notify the parent that it was received¹⁰.
The student's certified school counselor or other school staff must then hold an exit interview to learn why the student is leaving and what could be done to keep the student in school¹⁰.
The counselor or other school staff must also tell the student about other ways to continue their education, such as adult education and high school equivalency exam preparation¹⁰.

Attendance team

If the school's child study team finds a pattern of nonattendance developing, whether or not the absences are excused, a meeting with the parent must be scheduled to identify remedies. The team may let the parent attend virtually or by telephone if the parent cannot attend in person⁶.
If the parent or child does not attend, the meeting is held anyway; the team must make written recommendations to remediate the truancy and give them to the parent within 7 days⁶.
If the first meeting does not solve the problem, the team must use frequent teacher-family communication, try to find the reasons for the truancy and offer remedies or refer the family to services (including scholarship options if the learning environment is a concern), evaluate alternative education programs, and use attendance contracts⁶.
The team may, but is not required to, refer the family to voluntary family services or other agencies, or recommend a truancy petition. It must be diligent in arranging intervention services and reports the case to the district superintendent only when all reasonable efforts have been exhausted⁶.
Every school serving any students in kindergarten through grade 8 must run an early warning system; one indicator is attendance below 90 percent, whether absences are excused or due to out-of-school suspension. A school-based team monitors the data and, when a student shows two or more indicators, sets interventions in consultation with the parent, unless the student is already served by an intervention program directed by a school-based, multidisciplinary team⁷.

Principals & districts

Upon each unexcused absence, or absence with an unknown reason, the principal or designee must contact the parent to find out the reason⁶.
When a teacher reports a possible pattern of nonattendance, the principal must refer the case to the school's child study team, unless there is clear evidence that the absences are not a pattern. If the team finds a pattern developing, the principal must notify the district superintendent and the district's home education contact⁶.
The principal or designee must notify the district school board of each minor student who accumulates 15 unexcused absences in a period of 90 calendar days, reporting at the end of each school quarter⁸.
The district school board must verify that schools reporting 15 or more unexcused absences within a 90-day period have complied with the requirements for remediating truancy at the school level or pursuing appropriate court intervention. A school that has not must give the board a remedial action plan within 30 days and follow up within 90 days to confirm every truancy case was addressed, through the child's enrollment and regular attendance or referral to the appropriate court or agency⁸.
Each district school board must set an attendance policy that includes the required number of days of attendance and the number of absences and tardies after which a written explanation must be on file at the school. Board policies must require parents to justify each absence, and must provide that schools track excused and unexcused absences and contact the home after an unexcused absence or an absence with an unknown reason; each school decides whether an absence is excused under board criteria^9,6.

Recent changes

What changed lately

A 2025 juvenile justice law (SB 1344) took effect on July 1, 2025; among other things, it provides for early truancy intervention and for added services when a student is found to be a truant status offender¹¹.
Under the truancy statute as it now reads, when the school determines that a student subject to compulsory school attendance has had at least five unexcused absences (or absences with unknown reasons) within a calendar month, 10 such absences within a 90-calendar-day period, or more than 15 unexcused absences in a 90-calendar-day period, the superintendent or designee may file a truancy petition seeking early truancy intervention¹².
If the court finds the student missed any of the alleged days, it must find the child a truant status offender, order the student to attend school and the parent to ensure attendance, and review the case at least every 45 days¹².
The 2025 law also changed child study team rules, including allowing a parent to attend the meeting virtually or by telephone and letting the meeting go ahead if the parent does not attend¹³.
Not law: lawmakers discussed a chronic absenteeism bill for the 2024 session, but none passed². In 2026, bills to require a mandatory alert when a student reaches the truancy threshold (SB 1190 and the identical HB 1181) died in committee on March 13, 2026^14,15.

Accountability

How the state holds schools to it

Florida's school grades are based on components listed in state law, such as test passing rates, learning gains and, for high schools, graduation rates; attendance is not one of those components¹⁶.
The state's district report card must include measures of each district's success in improving student attendance¹⁶.
Each school's early warning system must include data on how many students show two or more warning indicators and how many students, by grade, show each indicator, along with the interventions used⁷.
The Florida Department of Education tracks both students who miss 21 or more days and students absent 10% or more of the school year, in part to meet federal ESSA requirements².

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Sources

American Enterprise Institute (Nat Malkus). From Attendance Crisis to Chronic Condition? Tracking Post-Pandemic Chronic Absenteeism into 2025, Table A3. State-Reported Chronic Absenteeism Data, by State, School Years 2017-25 (columns 2017 to 2025 by spring year; the last value is 2025 = the 2024-25 school year; rates rounded to whole percent) (opens in a new tab) (2026-06-30)
University of Florida Education Policy Research Center. Roll Call: Unpacking Chronic Absenteeism in Florida (policy brief, FLDOE data) (opens in a new tab) (2025-03)
Governing (Orlando Sentinel / South Florida Sun Sentinel analysis). Student Absenteeism in Florida Up 50% Since Pandemic (opens in a new tab) (2025-06-05)
American Enterprise Institute (Nat Malkus). From Attendance Crisis to Chronic Condition? Tracking Post-Pandemic Chronic Absenteeism into 2025 (opens in a new tab) (2026-06-30)
The Florida Legislature. Fla. Stat. § 1003.23 Attendance records and reports (2026) (opens in a new tab) (2026)
The Florida Legislature. Fla. Stat. § 1003.26(1)(b) Enforcement of school attendance (2026) (opens in a new tab) (2026)
The Florida Legislature. Fla. Stat. § 1001.42(18)(b) Early warning system (2026) (opens in a new tab) (2026)
The Florida Legislature. Fla. Stat. § 1003.27(2)(b) Court procedure and penalties (2026) (opens in a new tab) (2026)
The Florida Legislature. Fla. Stat. § 1003.24 Parents responsible for attendance of children; attendance policy (2026) (opens in a new tab) (2026)
The Florida Legislature. Fla. Stat. § 1003.21(1)(c) School attendance (2026) (opens in a new tab) (2026)
The Florida Senate. CS/CS/CS/SB 1344 (2025): Juvenile Justice, bill page (opens in a new tab) (2025-06-23)
The Florida Legislature. Fla. Stat. § 984.151 Early truancy intervention; truancy petition; judgment (2026) (opens in a new tab) (2026)
The Florida Senate, Committee on Criminal Justice. 2025 Summary of Legislation Passed: CS/CS/CS/SB 1344 Juvenile Justice (opens in a new tab) (2025)
The Florida Senate. SB 1190 (2026): Enforcement of School Attendance, bill page (opens in a new tab) (2026-03-13)
The Florida Senate. HB 1181 (2026): Enforcement of School Attendance, bill page (opens in a new tab) (2026-03-13)
The Florida Legislature. Fla. Stat. § 1008.34(3)(b) School grading system (2026) (opens in a new tab) (2026)