Dear County and District Superintendents, Charter School Administrators, and School Attendance Review Board Chairpersons:

Model School Attendance Review Board Recognition Program
2021–22

You are cordially invited to participate in the 2021–22 Model School Attendance Review Board (SARB) Recognition Program, which is sponsored by the California Department of Education (CDE) in cooperation with the California Association of Supervisors of Child Welfare and Attendance (CASCWA).

This program has been revised to identify and recognize multi-tiered attendance improvement programs at the district or county level that have adapted to our current circumstances during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Student attendance or participation is more crucial than ever, but many attendance interventions have been modified to address students in independent study and students in quarantine. However, what has not changed is the need to have a multi-tiered system of support that prevents attendance problems in the first place as well as a system that identifies problems early and creates a safety net if early interventions at the school are exhausted.

This year, there will be four content areas in the application. The content area that is the most critical requires applicants to describe in detail the different tiers of support they are providing to students, from the first tier of creating a welcoming school climate to the last tier of intensive intervention for students and families that did not respond to the school-level interventions.

The CDE encourages county and local SARBs that meet the eligibility criteria to submit an application to the Model SARB Recognition Program.

The Model SARB Application is available on the CDE Model SARB Recognition Program 2021–22 web page at https://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/ai/sb/modelrecog21.asp [NOTE: this application is no longer available]. Applications are due on February 4, 2022, by 4 p.m. The application must be submitted electronically in accordance with the instructions included in the application.

Model SARB Recognition Program award recipients will be recognized at the annual CASCWA State Conference scheduled for May 11–13, 2022, in Lake Tahoe’s Olympic Valley.

If you have any questions regarding this subject, please contact Dan Sackheim, Education Programs Consultant, Educational Options Office, by phone at 916-445-5595 or by email at dsackheim@cde.ca.gov.

Sincerely,

Tony Thurmond
California Superintendent of Public Instruction