Analyzing teacher absenteeism at East End schools

I don’t have kids, and I’ve never worked an education beat, so I was a bit baffled by The Richmonder’s recent report on the attendance record of Richmond Public Schools’ teachers. Student truancy, I’ve heard of. But per data obtained by the nonprofit newsroom’s reporter Mike Barber³ via public-records request, the city’s chronically underfunded public school system has been having trouble getting full-time staff educators to show up for work, too.

On average, Barber found that on average, RPS teachers missed 17.3 days of school last year—more than three full weeks of school. That’s markedly worse than counterparts in Henrico County, who averaged 13.2 days absent in the same period. Unfortunately, teachers at the city’s East End schools underperformed the city’s already low average, posting an average of 19.18 days out in the 2023-2024 school year, according to analysis of The Richmonder’s data by The Lookout. Here’s the breakdown:

You can also find this spreadsheet in The Lookout’s share drive. The nine RPS schools above are those that serve the East End, according to an index on the Church Hill Association’s website. One third of these are in the bottom quartile of teacher attendance for the entire city.

Reliable broader-scale data on teacher absenteeism is hard to come by, as even in the post-pandemic scramble to make up for “learning loss,” municipalities and states track the metric differently, or not at all. But in addition to trailing the RPS system overall, the East End’s schools don’t appear to match up well against available. benchmarks. The New York City Department of Education reported that around one-fifth of teachers were absent 11 days or more in the 2022-2023; researchers in Michigan found that roughly ~15% of the state’s public schoolteachers were absent in a given week during that same school year. A Brookings Institute analysis of four states’ teacher absenteeism rates, published in May 2025, shows East End and Richmond overall doing worse than Connecticut on teacher attendance (average days missed in the 2022-2023 school year: 13.4); the data The Richmonder was able to obtain are apples to oranges with the other states in that study.

The think-tank’s researchers also found that “[r]egardless of economic disadvantage, most schools have higher teacher absenteeism post-pandemic,” which seems to run counter to the situation in Richmond, where teacher absenteeism in the historically impoverished East End is higher than the rest of the city’s.

“As a Division, we know that consistency in the classroom is a key driver of student success,” an RPS spokesperson told The Richmonder in a statement, touting increased investment in recruiting/retention, more flexibility around religious observances, and additional “Wellness Days.” All well (ahem) and good—but whether it reduces the absenteeism in the East End remains to be seen.

📜 Possum Poetry

Possum Poetry is original verse written exclusively for The Lookout by Penelope Poubelle, the Lookout’s litter critter-at-large. If you spot roadside trash you’d like her to immortalize in doggerel, email a photo to [email protected]. All submissions anonymous!

🎒 Back-to-school drives in—and from—the 7th District

And now, for some positive news! In advance of the first day of school for the RPS system (Monday 8/18)² , the eighth-annual Ultimate Backpack Supply Drive took place again last week at Virginia Commonwealth University, where over 400 volunteers packed donated bags with free supplies for RPS students in need. The Richmonder’s Victoria F. Ifatusin reported that the event—which started in 2017 as a campaign by the 7th District’s school board member, Cheryl Burke. School Board Member Cheryl Burke—has shipped over 150,000 backpacks for the city’s students all-time; organizers are targeting 30,000 this year alone. They’ll be sent to students in need in Richmond, as well as Henrico and Chesterfield Counties.

Nationally, the United Way estimates that approximately one in four students (~16 million or so) come from families that can’t afford school supplies. That’s a damning indictment of virtually every institution¹ in this country, from the clowns in Congress that have repeatedly ratfucked efforts to raise the minimum wage, to corporations and their fellow travelers in the conservative legal establishment that have helped to force union density to its lowest point in almost a century, t— actually, I promised positive news, so let’s just leave it there for now.

If you weren’t able to make the VCU drive, good news—there’s another event coming up right here in the neighborhood to collect donated school supplies for the city’s schoolchildren. On Monday evening—i.e., following the first day of school—the Church Hill Association is holding a back-to-school potluck and school-supply drive in lieu of its usual membership meeting. The picnic is being hosted by CHA members Genni Sasnett and Tom Wilds at their home (2617 E Franklin St) from 6:30-9pm. More info, including potluck assignments alphabetized by last name, right here.

And if you can’t swing that, you can drop off school supplies at 12 N. 30th Street from now through August 25th (two Mondays from now.) And if you can’t swing that… well, I dunno man, seems like you’re really busy? Not sure what else to tell you.

🗺️ More specifics on the Richmond speeding map

Vee Wright dropped the following comment on last week’s edition of The Lookout about MapRVA’s slick treatment on the City of Richmond’s speeding-data map:

My assumption was that this was a feature of MapRVA’s version, not a bug. In other words, the grid is green unless otherwise noted because the default expectation for a road system is that drivers are traveling at or under the posted limit, while speeding is a deviation from the default. But I didn’t want to make an ass out of you or me (or Vee), so I checked in with mapmaker Daniel Schep for clarification. His response via email from earlier this week:

There you have it. I imagine other Lookouts may have been wondering about that, so big thanks to Vee for the comment. Remember, comments are open for all on every edition of the newsletter. You can either click the comment button in the upper left (it looks sort of like this: 💬) or look for one of these buttons within the edition:

Questions about coverage are always welcome, as are observations, opinions, et cetera. Hope to see you there.

📢 Happenings on The Hill

• Falcon Smash bash: Triple Crossing Fulton is hosting the brewery’s end-of-summer block party this Saturday (8/16) from 12-5pm, featuring face-painting, ice cream, and more. Details here.

• Bug out: Join Church Hill’s first-ever (I think?) Cicada Parade this Saturday at 2pm as it loops around Jefferson Park “kazooing, crooning bad love songs, and gently bumping into trees and each other.” Here’s the buzz.

• Tranquil tunes: The third installment of the Church Hill Association’s Sunset Garden Concert Series at Reed Square is Sunday (8/17) at 7:30pm. The info you crave.

• Tap in: Second Bottle pairing wine with Spanish-style tapas from Mayor Meats on Thursday (8/14) from 8-10pm. Tickets are available now.

• Dine fine: There are a few tickets still available for Grisette’s Fosso Cancelli wine dinner two Wednesdays from now (8/27) at 6:30pm. Grab yours.

Happenings on The Hill is a digital bulletin board for events, causes, and other items of interest to East Enders that don’t necessarily merit full editorial treatment. Got something for a future edition? Email the relevant details, links, etc. to [email protected] for consideration!

📸 A Very CHill Photo

Want to share your Very CHill Photo from the neighborhood? Email it to [email protected] with your name as you’d like it to appear for publication, and the camera you shot it on.

1  Very much including Virginia’s own General Assembly. To choose just one shameful recent example, in 2023 the Commonwealth almost didn’t hold its customary tax holiday on school supplies because lawmakers just straight-up forgot about it, allowing it to expire. It did eventually happen, but only in mid-October, after everybody’s back-to-school shopping was already done. Great work all around.

2  For most grades/schools; there’s a staggered calendar, so some kids go back for the first day on Tuesday (8/19.)

3  Correction 8/15/25: A previous version of this edition misidentified the reporter who published The Richmonder’s piece on teacher absenteeism. It was Mike Barber. The Lookout regrets the error.