At the Washington School Board meeting on Wednesday, Superintendent Willie Stone talked about chronic absenteeism and its effects on students, “Chronic absenteeism is defined as a student missing ten percent of a school year, which that equals out to eighteen school days. Some of the data, if a student especially in early childhood or  in Kindergarten or first grade, is chronically absent just one of those two years, they only have a forty-one percent chance of being able to read at grade level by third grade.”The School Board will be reminding parents throughout the school year about the importance of attendance.