Oslo students much further away from school

The absence figures of 18,000 students in 22 upper secondary schools in Oslo, which VG has had access to, show a sharp increase in the number of hours students were out of the classroom in the first six weeks after classes started this autumn.

– I easily drop out of school when I sit at home and work. In the spring, I lost grades. You don’t get the same help. The monitoring of the school has been good, but it is a weak teaching. You walk around and are constantly worried about ending up in quarantine, says third grader Julie Brandvoll (18) at Kongshavn Upper Secondary School in Oslo.

– I hope you do not weaken your grades for the final exam next summer. We just have to bite our teeth to give it our all, says Brandvoll, who is also on the school’s operating board.

She describes the time home from school as “uncomfortable” and has already missed more than ten percent of her teaching days at school this semester: a week of quarantine due to an infection at school and a week of a mild cold. in which he had to stay home.

Since August, students at the school have been told not to attend school if they have mild respiratory infections or fever. They do not need a medical certificate and parents or students over 18 can write a self-declaration to the school.

Here are some of the findings from the VG survey, which includes all forms of recorded absence, including home enrollment, at the Oslo school:

• Three upper secondary schools have an increase of more than 80% in recorded absenteeism.
• Recorded absence has increased dramatically across the city and has increased by 42 percent.
• A principal talks about the underreporting of absenteeism at the school.

Figures for weeks 34 to 39 are taken from the Education Agency systems. The VG survey is the first time that the absence of a pandemic in the capital has been collected, calculated and published.

They include students with “truancy” – mild symptoms that may be a corona infection keep them from going to school, but they are healthy enough to do homework at home.

– I don’t notice much difference at school, but home schooling was cheap and required a lot of discipline. It probably would have had better grades without the closure, says Sondre Sanstøl (17), who is in second grade at Kongshavn and sits on the operating board.

Worried school researcher

The development attracts the attention of one of Norway’s leading researchers in upper and upper secondary education.

– It is worrying with such a high increase in absenteeism. Students do not have the right to an education when they report they are ill, and we know from research that students do better the longer they are in school. The figures that VG is now presenting are new knowledge and it is extremely important that you learn quickly from them to create the best long-term solutions for students, says Astrid Marie Jorde Sandsør, from the Department of Special Education at the University of Oslo.

After “absence due to self-reported illness”, “other agreed training” is the most used absence code. It shows that many students have done their homework from home during the pandemic.

Sandsør emphasizes that schools must accept that the pandemic can last a long time and that homeschooling has weaknesses.

– Several studies have shown that homeschooling mainly leads to learning loss in primary school, especially for students with a weak socioeconomic background. There is reason to believe that this will also be the case in upper secondary school. Schools must find ways to make up for the loss of education for students, both during and after the corona epidemic.

– The situation with a mixture of quarantines, home tuition and high absenteeism has particularly important consequences for students at the end of upper secondary school and upper secondary school. The grades they receive next summer are included in the diploma and affect education and career opportunities later in life, Sandsør says.

– Teachers in spaghetti

Elvebakken Upper Secondary is the largest in Oslo with 1,433 students.

– Teachers are in a division when they have to teach students who are at home and in the classroom at the same time. It’s about finding the balance between what teachers are capable of and what students need, principal Camilla Hauren Leirvik tells VG.

– It is important that students can be in school, emphasizes Leirvik.

Absence reports

A copy of the data to which VG was given access has been sent to the address of the Education Agency.

– The survey up to week 40 shows that absenteeism has increased. There are variations between schools, the area director of Oslo’s upper secondary schools at the Education Agency, Pål Riis, tells VG.

Four schools have registered fewer absentees than in the same period last year.

The principal of H20 (Hersleb Upper Middle) answers the following questions about why the school’s absentee figures this year are significantly lower than the same period last year:

– Yes, this number is probably a bit misleading. This is primarily due to a lack of information on our part in the absence system. The absence is great and it is very demanding in these times for the students, especially the motivation. It is different if students are self-regulating and if they have good job opportunities at home. It is important that students have a set time to get up, meet a teacher at school, and teachers play an important role in the lives of many of our students, Astrid Grytte tells VG.

– Problems are compounded for those students who have many challenges in their lives, such as the conditions of the home. Absence from Oslo school has been a challenge for many years and now it is not easier. Low absenteeism is important to completing school, says Grytte.

Thus, the total absence in Oslo schools is higher than what appears in the figures of the Education Agency.

Principal with prayer

One of the schools with the steepest increase in recorded absenteeism is Kongshavn in Ekeberg. The school has 530 students citywide and posted an 82 percent increase in classroom absenteeism in the first six weeks after starting in late August.

Principal Knut Jørgen Kopperud emphasizes that students are good at following the rules of staying home when they have respiratory infections and that absences are carefully recorded. Some students have done school assignments or assignments from home.

It has great appeal for all parents with children in high school:

– When students turn 18 and go to 3rd grade, the school’s duty to inform parents disappears and they can document the absence themselves. My prayer is that parents continue to follow up on the absence of children, even if they have reached the age of majority. Most people who struggle with absence go to third grade and will finish school this spring, Kopperud tells VG.

The sharp increase in absenteeism also does not surprise the two school students who encounter GV.

– Most students are good at attending school, but there are probably some who will take a bit of the new absence rule, when it is easier to get a valid absence without documentation from a doctor, says Sanstøl.

Absence in the West

There have been relatively few quarantines in schools on the western edge of the capital, but rising absenteeism affects there too. Oslo Handelsgymnasium had a 68 percent increase in classroom absences the first six weeks of this year compared to last year. A good number of them have participated in teaching via PC or with their own presentations from home, explains the rector Camilla K. Mehl to VG.

– We have encouraged students to stay away from illnesses. And it is very important that students continue to follow that encouragement, Mehl tells VG.

– It is very laborious to register as carefully as we have done, but it also means that when an infection occurs among the students of the Oslo Handelsgymnasium, there will be few fellow students who need to be quarantined, says Mehl.