How St. HOPE Public Schools Linked Student Suspensions to Attendance Patterns
A California charter school network operating elementary, middle, and high school campuses was struggling to understand the relationship between suspensions and chronic absenteeism.
The Challenge
St. HOPE school network operates elementary, middle, and high school campuses and was struggling to understand the relationship between suspensions and chronic absenteeism. With limited data analysis capabilities and staff spread thin, they needed insights that could drive more effective interventions.
Key Pain Points:
Difficulty determining if suspensions were actually changing student behavior
Limited visibility into which students had unexpected attendance patterns
Administrators lacking data-driven recommendations for improving attendance
No clear evidence on which interventions actually worked
Resource constraints with multiple staff members on leave
The Manta Solution
The school leveraged Manta to analyze their existing attendance and suspension data. Within minutes, the system generated insights and recommendations that would have taken significant manual effort to produce.
The Analysis
Manta did multiple analyses that would typically require weeks of work from a data team:
Campus Comparison: Revealed that middle school had unexpectedly higher suspension rates than elementary and high school, challenging previous assumptions
Attendance Patterns: Showed that frequently absent students were 3-10 times more likely to be suspended, highlighting a clear connection between attendance and behavior issues
Intervention Effectiveness: Examined how different approaches to suspensions affected student attendance afterward, finding some surprising positive outcomes
Program Recommendations: Tested various disciplinary approaches and identified restorative justice as a promising alternative with measurable benefits
Organization Impact
Current Impact:
Found surprising differences in suspension rates across elementary, middle, and high school campuses
Predicted impact of type and length of suspensions on future attendance
Discovered which discipline approaches actually helped improve student attendance
Gave school leaders specific data on which strategies worked best at each campus
Future Applications:
Track how well the new restorative practices program works compared to suspensions
Study what helps students stay engaged in their first weeks to improve retention
Give teachers easy-to-use data tools to better support struggling students
Key Takeaways
Nuanced Understanding of Behavior Interventions: The analysis revealed a complex relationship between suspensions and attendance, challenging assumptions that suspensions simply worsen attendance problems
Data-Driven Discipline Strategy: The findings showed how different approaches had varying effects across different campuses, enabling more targeted interventions
User-Friendly Insights: The platform presented complex statistical relationships in accessible ways that non-technical administrators could immediately understand and act upon
Evidence-Based Program Implementation: Based on Manta's recommendation, the school implemented a restorative justice program and is now using the platform to measure its effectiveness compared to traditional suspensions
Conclusion
By analyzing the actual impact of different disciplinary approaches, Manta helped St. HOPE replace ineffective suspension practices with data-proven alternatives that kept more students in class.
