Talking with our local school administrators, this does seem to be the biggest challenge they're facing. From their point of view, it's just caused by (typically poorer) parents who don't care about their kids' education and saw how it seemed to be optional during COVID and so just don't make their kids go if they don't feel like it. It's really sad, and it sounds incredibly hard for anyone else to do anything about.
My experience with my teen has been that, post-pandemic, he and all of his friends simply decided they didn't want to be inside/bored like they were. We're struggling big-time to keep ours in class. We've tried incentives. We've levied punishments. It's like neither they nor their friends care - at all - about any of it (certainly much less afraid of consequences than I ever was).
Add the much more common use of drugs to the mix (from 14 on), phones that are not required to be put away in class, and it's very tough to keep them on track.
I didn't have half of the distractions/opportunities for entertainment kids these days have, and it was hard for me to muster up the enthusiasm.
This is the first comment I see directing the problem at the parents, where I believe it rightly belongs. Is it not the parent's responsibility to make sure their child gets to school safely and on time every day?
Or take an example of a high school student who adamantly refuses to attend school, do you eventually just let him "get away with it" or do you put him in a correctional facility?
