School Attendance

The School encourages parents to establish a priority of regular, daily attendance for their children. We fully expect families to plan their trips to coincide with school holidays. There are, regrettably, times when parents choose to keep their children out of school in order to leave early for a weekend or scheduled school holiday, to extend a weekend or scheduled school holiday, or to create a holiday where none existed. Because of the resulting disruption to the learning process (students miss direct instruction, hands-on learning activities, and the conversation that is essential to emerging understanding), the School strongly discourages these unexcused absences.

Only in PK3/PK4 is absence for travel or other non-essential purposes  sanctioned, although not encouraged.  It is recorded as “unexcused” at any other level. We fully expect families to plan their trips to coincide with school holidays.

 

Notifying the School of Absences

Parents should notify the School when their child will be absent.

They may do so by emailing that information to attendance@stpatsdc.org and including the child’s homeroom teacher or advisor as a recipient.

Parents may also report absences to 202-342-2806 (Early Childhood Division), 202-342-2805 (Lower School), or 202-650-5324 (Middle School), but an email to attendance@stpatsdc.org will suffice.

Please send the email by 8:30 am or the night before, if possible. Unreported absences will prompt a call home to inquire about the nature of the absence.