Improving attendance of chronic absentees in primary schools: A study from District East of Delhi

Abstract

Regular attendance is a prerequisite for the desired learning outcomes of the students in the primary schools. Poor attendance is a pervasive problem in primary schools in India resulting in poor academic achievements of students. The present action research was conducted with objectives to identify chronic absentee students and to implement appropriate interventions to improve their attendance.  The class-level and individualized interventions were carried out among 40 chronic absentee students identified in 11 classes in three primary schools. The interventions in the study brought desirable success by improving the attendances of 34 chronic absentee students out of 40. Overall percentage of attendance of these students improved from 33% in pre-intervention period to 74% percent in post-intervention period. The study indicates the usefulness of locally contextualized interventions to improve the attendance among primary school students.