Attendance Recovery Tracking

  • Updated on Jan 12, 2026
  • Published on Jul 1, 2025
  • 6 minute(s) read
  • Jevon Baird
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AR Tracking Requirement Summary

  • Refer to CALPADS Update Flash #305 for more information regarding the New Data Collections for Attendance Recovery Program and Expanded Learning Programs.

  • Beginning in 2025-2026 fiscal year, school districts, county offices of education and classroom-based charter schools may choose to offer an Attendance Recovery program to eligible students enrolled in classroom-based programs. The AR program is an optional program for students in grades TK−12, that LEAs may provide to enable students to recoup absences for the purposes of average daily attendance (ADA) apportionment. ADA recovery is capped at the fewer of 10 days per student or the student’s total absences for the fiscal year (July 1 - June 30). An AR program may only operate outside of the regular school day (before or after school), or on weekend or intersession days (EC Section 46211(b)(1)).

  • In-person instruction is a condition of apportionment. AR excludes students enrolled in non-classroom-based programs, a non-classroom-based charter school, or a charter school that serves pupils pursuant to EC Section 47612.5. AR recovery excludes students continually enrolled in independent study for more than 15 schooldays (EC Section 46211(g)(1) and (2)).

  • AR does not replace/modify Saturday School (the existing method to claim ADA for past absences).

  • ELP and AR can be offered concurrently (if the requirements of both programs are met).

  • The LEA must track and report attendance from participation in an AR program separately from attendance generated during the regular school day (EC Section 46211(d)(3)). The student’s participation time can be documented in daily or hourly increments, as appropriate to the duration of the AR sessions offered. A student may accrue AR participation time in hourly increments over multiple sessions or multiple days to meet the applicable minimum daily minute requirement, after which the LEA may claim average daily attendance (ADA) for the AR attendance.

  • A day of attendance for apportionment is generated by a student once they have participated in an AR program for the minimum daily minutes that apply to the student under EC Section 46211(e)(1).

  • An individual student cannot generate more than one day of attendance for any calendar day of participation in an AR program (EC Section 46211(d)(1)).

  • Students may “bank” AR days if participation time in AR is accrued before a student is absent. This includes attending AR programs in the summer prior to the beginning of the academic school year.

  • AR attendance must be reported during the Principal Apportionment cycle, through the Principal Apportionment Data Collection (PADC). Make-up attendance generated through AR is included in the regular ADA totals at P-1, P-2, and Annual. It is also reported on a separate line for informational purposes. When reporting attendance to the PADC web app, an LEA may only claim AR ADA for absences that the student accrued in the complete months of attendance being reported.

  • LEAs must report in CALPADS EOY submission (STAS file) the total number of Attendance Recovery days (up to 10) for each participating student for the fiscal school year (July 1 - June 30). This data will be used to calculate an alternate chronic absenteeism rate that will be posted on DataQuest.

SchoolWise AR Tracking Guide

  • SchoolWise has added the capability to record the total number of Attendance Recovery (AR) ADA days in the desktop app Student Forms for PADC and CALPADS reporting purposes.

    • Class rosters can be setup in SchoolWise for tracking AR attendance in the Desktop Attendance form or Web Attendance form. When creating a class roster for tracking AR participation time, “Positive Attendance” must be enabled in both the Course Section Defaults tab and in each course section. When 'Positive Attendance' is used, students are ‘considered absent unless marked present'. When taking attendance, mark students present (when present) or leave the attendance record blank (Not Taken) when absent. AR courses should only use positive attendance tracking (considered absent unless marked present). Negative attendance recording could lead to potential audit compliance issues. See below for additional course setup guidance.

Setup AR Attendance Tracking

Step1: Determine when AR will be offered:

  • If you plan on operating an AR program only on in-session dates (before school or after school), the regular ADA calendar track can be used to take attendance on in-session weekdays.

  • If you plan on operating an AR program on a non-in-session date, please contact SchoolWise support to setup an alternate ELP 12-month calendar track. Please provide the specific dates AR will be offered. This will allow you to take attendance on in-session weekdays and non-in-session dates (holiday, intersession, weekend, etc).

Step 2: Determine how AR participation time will be tracked (daily or hourly).

Option A) Setup daily AR participation time tracking:

  • Daily participation tracking can be used if the AR session duration meets the minimum daily minute requirement in a calendar day. Ex. Present = 1 day of AR participation.

  • Create a course for ‘Attendance Recovery Days’ using the Courses form and Courses tab (do not select the ADA Grade Levels tab). Use these Course Details: Grade Range = Not Applicable, Credits  = 0,  Marking System = None, Course State Code (CBEDS Code) = 6012, and set the Course Term to Full Year (if using the regular ADA calendar track) or AR Year (if using the alternate ELP 12-month calendar track). In the course section defaults tab, enable positive attendance and set the default minutes for the class.

  • Create sections as needed. Enable positive attendance and set the default minutes for each section. Use Period 9 for these course sections. Set the section Schedule Term to use the regular ADA calendar track (for taking attendance on in-session weekdays only) or the alternate ELP 12-month calendar track (for taking attendance on any day enabled in the ELP 12-month calendar track).

Option B) Setup hourly AR participation time tracking:

  • Hourly participation time tracking can be used to track accumulated time in hourly increments. A student may accrue time in hourly increments over multiple sessions or multiple days to meet the applicable minimum daily minute requirement, after which the LEA may claim 1 day of AR participation. AR participation time must sum to the applicable minimum daily minutes to generate a whole day of AR ADA. AR participation time may be accumulated in hourly increments, but not in minutes or fractions of an hour. Any AR participation time documented in increments of less than one hour does not count toward meeting the required instructional time for AR. Ex. 1-59 min = 0 hours, 60-119 min = 1 hour, 120-179 min = 2 hours, 180-239 min = 3 hours, 240-299 min = 4 hours.

  • Create a course for ‘Attendance Recovery Hours’ using the Courses form and Courses tab (do not select the ADA Grade Levels tab). Use these Course Details: Grade Range = Not Applicable, Credits  = 0,  Marking System = None, Course State Code (CBEDS Code) = 6012, and set the Course Term to Full Year (if using the regular ADA calendar track) or AR Year (if using the alternate ELP 12-month calendar track). In the course section defaults tab, enable positive attendance and set the default minutes (full-hour increments) for the class.

  • Create course sections as needed. Enable positive attendance and set the default minutes (full-hour increments) for each section. Use Period 9 for these course sections. Set the section Schedule Term to use the regular ADA calendar track (for taking attendance on in-session weekdays only) or the alternate ELP 12-month calendar track (for taking attendance on any day enabled in the ELP 12-month calendar track).

  • If fixed length AR sessions are used, the default minutes (full-hour increments) for each section can be used for tracking participation time (Present = X hours).

  • If variable length AR sessions are used, please contact SchoolWise support to enable check-in/check-out time tracking function in the SchoolWise web attendance forms. Please provide your default start/end times for each course section. Click here for more information regarding attendance time tracking.

Additional Resources

  • Click here for general information regarding course setup.

  • Click here for general information regarding course enrollment.

  • Click here for general information regarding attendance recording.

Reference