Sample work · fictional firm, county, and numbers
Northfield Research Group · Luna County Student Wellbeing Study

Chapter 3: Why students stop coming, and what brings them back

Missing school and feeling low are tangled together. Here is how the loop works in Luna County, and two places to break it.

1 · The fever

More than one in five students misses too much school

Chronic absence means missing 10% of the year. It climbs in middle school and jumps in 9th grade.

22%K 18%1 14%2 13%3 13%4 14%5 19%6 22%7 24%8 34%9 31%10 29%11 30%12 Grade
2 · The hidden load

Four in ten feel sad most days. Few get help.

Picture 100 Luna County high schoolers, one desk each. This is what the student survey shows.

Sad, got help (12) Sad, no help (28) Not reporting sadness (60)
3 · The loop

Missing school and feeling low feed each other

Each one makes the other worse. That's why it's hard to stop.

Misses school Falls behind, isolated More anxious, sad Dreads going back
4 · The puzzle

The new counselors didn't move the number

In 2024 the district added school counselors. High school chronic absence barely changed.

0% 20% Counselors added 33%32%32%31% 2022–232023–242024–252025–26
5 · The reveal

Students who kept going came back

Fewer missed days in the year after starting counseling, by number of sessions.

1–5 sessions55 in 100 students 0.4 days 6–19 sessions27 in 100 students 1.8 days 20+ sessions18 in 100 students 6.2 days
Only 18 in 100 counseled students reached 20 sessions. Help worked. Too few students got enough of it, so the county number barely moved.
6 · Two fixes

Catch the dip early. Keep help steady.

Attendance for students who started counseling, by month around their first visit.

80% 90% First counseling visit Dip starts here −5−3−10+1+3+5 Months from first visit
A

Catch the dip early

Flag students whose attendance slips three months in a row. Offer a check-in, not a warning.

B

Keep help steady

Plan for 20 sessions, not one visit. Track how many students get there each term.

What this shows, and what it doesn't. Absence and sadness rise and fall together, and steady help lines up with students coming back. That points to a cause. It doesn't prove one. Transport, illness, family duties, and bullying also keep students home.