SUE KRIZNIK

“You have to be creative to keep the kids here, and we’ve seen a lot of great improvement.”

United Way’s Be There attendance initiative strives to teach kids the importance of showing up to school every day. And at West Allegheny High School, the program is working.  The percentage of students who are chronically absent has dropped from 22% to 16% since the start of the program last year.

West Allegheny High School’s dedication to school attendance has awarded them a $500 United Way of Southwestern PA Be There mini grant. Sue Kriznik, West Allegheny’s career and transition coordinator, has been spearheading the effort to keep students in school through a series of programs and incentives.

“Students are shocked to find out that chronic absenteeism is missing two days a month,” Sue said. “When you add those numbers up that’s 20 days each year, and that makes a real difference in grades, graduation rates and more.”

Students who have perfect, or near perfect, attendance have opportunities to win gift cards, gift baskets and other items. “We recently gave the kids sunglasses and they were wearing them all over the place,” Sue said. “It was so wonderful to see them have that pride.”

Another way the program encourages attendance is by displaying the names of students who have 90 – 100% attendance on banners and stickers throughout the halls. “The kids were taking selfies with their names,” Sue mused. The school also plans to have an ice cream social at the end of the year to reward the students.

In the future, Sue plans to use the grant to extend the outreach to the students’ parents and develop ways for them to get involved.

“We just want to keep the students on target,” Sue said. “We want them here.”