A tiger walking through golden morning light

Woodlake Unified • We Are One

Attendance Intervention Navigator

Identify early. Discover the barrier. Match the intervention. Monitor the response. Escalate only when necessary.

Escalation is not the measure of a successful attendance system.Resolving barriers at the earliest appropriate level is.

Districtwide attendance practice guide

Tiered Attendance Intervention Guidance

One common process for responding to attendance concerns across every WUSD site — with decision-support tools for the moment a staff member is actually standing in front of the problem.

For administrators

Attendance Action Center

See the Pattern • Find the Barrier • Take Action • Monitor • Re-Engage

A leadership and problem-solving workspace that sits above the tiers: blind-spot checks, pattern decoding, return-tomorrow planning, meeting prep, period and day-of-week analyzers, site plans, and a full strategy generator — all anonymous.

The tiered continuum

Select a tier for practice guidance, decision points, staff roles, and documentation tools.

  1. Tier 1Universal PreventionConnection, clear expectations, consistent communication, and schoolwide data awareness.
  2. Tier 2Early Identification & Site-Level InterventionBarrier identification, matched intervention, and short-cycle monitoring at the site.
  3. Tier 3Multidisciplinary School-Site Support (SST / MTSS)Coordinate and intensify support for barriers that targeted intervention did not resolve.
  4. Tier 3+SART Formalized Attendance InterventionFormalize expectations, supports, and accountability with the family in writing.
  5. Tier 4SARB Intensive CoordinationDistrict and community coordination, intervention, and accountability together.
  6. Follow-UpRe-Engagement & Follow-UpStabilize at 30 days, evaluate at 60, determine the path at 90.
Students do not automatically move through every tier. Attendance concerns should be addressed at the lowest appropriate level of intervention, and successful intervention should prevent unnecessary escalation.
Required attendance notifications and statutory attendance procedures continue alongside this intervention framework. A required notice may occur alongside intervention, but it does not replace intervention.

Three questions every intervention answers

  1. 1. What is the barrier?
  2. 2. What did we do about it?
  3. 3. Did it work?

The common process

Used at Tier 2 and carried forward through every later tier.

  1. NOTICE
  2. OBSERVE
  3. ASK
  4. IDENTIFY
  5. MATCH
  6. INTERVENE
  7. MONITOR
  8. DECIDE

Each step is documented as it happens, so the intervention story travels with the student instead of being recreated at every meeting.

Guiding philosophy

Applies at every tier, at every site.

  • Attendance concerns should be addressed at the lowest appropriate level of intervention.
  • Students do not automatically move through every tier.
  • Successful intervention should prevent unnecessary escalation.
  • The multidisciplinary site team should not be where the barrier is first discovered.
  • Use the site-level team structure that fits the barrier and local practice — SST, MTSS, or an equivalent team. Not every student must pass through every team before receiving the next level of support.
  • A contact is not automatically an intervention.
  • A required attendance notice may occur alongside intervention, but it does not replace intervention.
  • Every intervention should identify the barrier it is intended to address.
  • Every intervention needs an owner and a review date.
  • If an intervention was not implemented, do not automatically conclude that it failed.
  • Unknown is a valid barrier status. Do not guess.
  • Student and family voice should inform attendance intervention whenever appropriate.
  • Support and accountability can exist together.
  • The goal is re-engagement, not simply referral completion.

Quick reference

Jump to any section of the navigator.

Decision support

Tools for the moment, not just the manual

What am I seeing? What should I do? Who should do it? When do we review it? What happens next?

If the family follows everything we are asking them to do, have we done everything we reasonably can to make attendance possible? Escalation is not the goal. Re-engagement is.

One-page orientation

How to use this app

The same six steps every WUSD site follows, and where in the Navigator each step lives. Download the two-page infographic for staff meetings, onboarding, or the front of a binder.

  1. 1

    Notice early

    Aeries tells you WHAT is happening. The Navigator helps you work out WHY and WHAT NEXT.

    Start Here Navigator · Action Center

  2. 2

    Ask, then identify the barrier

    Use nonjudgmental prompts with student and family. “Unknown” is a valid barrier status.

    Conversation Toolkit → Barrier Finder

  3. 3

    Match the intervention

    Choose tier-appropriate supports matched to the barrier — not to the absence count.

    Strategy Builder · SART Assistant

  4. 4

    Assign owner and dosage

    Name who does it, how often, and for how long. An unowned strategy is not an intervention.

    Who Does What? · What Counts?

  5. 5

    Review the response

    Check fidelity before judging results, then decide: stay, modify, step down, or intensify.

    Fidelity Check · Step-Down

  6. 6

    Escalate only when necessary

    Move to SST / MTSS team, SART, or SARB with the documented story — never as a first response.

    Tier 3 · SART · Tier 4 SARB