This report analyzes the costs and benefits of truancy reduction programs in Colorado that employ a family case management approach.
While research has documented the many deleterious outcomes related to truancy and chronic school absence, relatively little research has focused on evaluating the effectiveness of truancy reduction programs or their relative costs and benefits. This report presents a cost-benefit analysis of the Adams County Truancy Reduction Project, the Denver Truancy Reduction Demonstration Project, and Pueblo’s Project Respect. All three programs are similar in their approach to truancy, which is viewed as a family problem and addressed through intensive family case management rather than through punitive measures. The programs differ in their scope, budget, and their situation relative to their local school, their district, and local court policies. The analysis relies on assessing the costs and benefits of three approaches to dealing with truancy: (1) doing nothing; (2) taking a court-centered approach; and (3) using the family case management approach. Following a review of the current research regarding the causes and consequences of truancy, the report reviews the costs and benefits of the court approach to truancy and the family case management approach to truancy. The analysis concludes that the societal and economic costs of truancy far outweigh the costs interred by the truancy prevention approaches. Overall, both the court and the case management approaches are economically valuable and, in fact, any truancy reduction program showing even minor success would be economically valuable. Tables, appendixes, bibliography