When students at El Puente M.S. 50 Community School in Brooklyn, New York, log into Zoom at 8:30 a.m. each school day, they’re greeted by a remote school coach who takes attendance, checks in with students and stays online with them throughout the entire school day, even as teachers come and go.

“Every time the bell rings, there’s a little transition time where the coach does some more community building like, ‘Hey, great job in ELA class. I really liked your participation,’” said Principal Ben Honoroff.

Then, the coach preps students for the next class and introduces the incoming teacher with a theme song. And if any student is late to school or drops off halfway through the day, the coaches are texting parents to see what’s up.

These strategies — the addition of coaches and hosting students in one Zoom session all day, rather than having them switch in between classes — came after lessons learned in the spring, when student attendance was inconsistent based on time of day and subject area. School leaders realized they needed to do more to keep students engaged.

The approach seems to be working for El Puente M.S. 50, which has seen “significantly higher” online attendance this fall, compared to the spring, Honoroff said.

And on the day he talked to Education Dive, the school had 100% attendance — not an easy feat in the remote learning era of COVID-19, where access to Wi-Fi, technology hiccups, family situations and other factors exacerbated by the pandemic have seen students drop off from participating in online learning, worrying education advocates and administrators alike about increased levels of chronic absenteeism at a time with little oversight and uniformity in how schools are keeping track of attendance.

Read the full article about increased absences during COVID-19 by Natalie Gross at Education Dive.