Conclusion
Sir Geoffrey Vickers, a British systems scientist, noted ‘‘the
history of public health might well be written as a record of
successive re-definings of the unacceptable’’ (Vickers,
1958, p. 600). School absences have been a problem in the
United States for the past 40 years and have complex etiologies.
There is little debate that excessive absences waste
school resources and contribute to educational deficits, but
defining chronic absenteeism in early school as ‘‘unacceptable’’
has yet to happen. This is largely because truant young
children do not commit crimes, and aggregate data hide individuals’
absences.