I need any research or statistics showing number of days late or tardy
for school students, and correlations between days late and school
performance or social factors.  What I'm really looking for is a way
to quantify that a 50% rate of tardiness is extreme and unusual, and
may have a detrimental effect on a child.

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Request for Question Clarification by darrel-ga on 07 Jun 2003 18:55 PDT

Hello benfranklin--

Could you please clarify what you're looking for a bit?

What should be the scope of this research? Are you looking for a
particular U.S. State? How many states would you like researched in
this regard? In which city and state is this 50 percent tardiness
rate?

Thank you,

darrel-ga

Hello,

Most of the research that I found on school tardiness address the
causes of tardiness, rather than the affects of tardiness.  In most
cases, the causes of tardiness also cause poor performance in school. 
So, there is often a correlation between tardiness, poor performance,
and these factors that presumably cause both.

The most common cause discussed was poor nutrition.  Much of the
research therefore was associated with research on federally funded
school breakfast programs.  These studies find that there is a
correlation between tardiness and lower achievement simply because
they are both correlated with poor nutrition.  Here is a list of web
pages on this particular topic.

web articles on school breakfast programs
http://www.frac.org/html/news/breakfastscorecard00.html
http://www.ctpta.org/legislative/breakfast.htm
http://www.cppp.org/products/media/pressreleases/prr1097.pdf
http://www.nationaldairycouncil.org/lvl04/nutrilib/digest/dairydigest_711c.htm
http://www.schoolnurse.com/med_info/breakfast.html

But, they don’t address your actual question.  

Here is an excellent and informative article on the Chicago school
system at
http://www.consortium-chicago.org/publications/pdfs/p0a09.pdf.
This article primarily discusses truancy.  However, tardiness is
associated with this, as it often causes students to miss their first
few classes of the day.  This article gives some tardiness statistics.
 While the numbers seem excessively high to me, it does state that by
the end of the year, over half of their ninth graders have missed over
two weeks of their first class of the day.  This article does seem to
define extreme truancy as including a 50% level of missed classes.  It
also discusses the correlation between missing classes and low
achievement.  In highs school there is a high correlation.  However,
it also points out that in high schools where expectations of students
are low, even the good students miss have a high rate of missed
classes.  There seems to be a greater correlation in high school that
lack of skills cause tardiness rather than the other way around.  It
suggests that students entering high school unprepared with the
necessary skills are more likely to be tardy and absence than students
that enter high school prepared.

A study called “Strategies and Successes in School Dropout Prevention”
discusses the correlation of tardiness, among other things, and
dropping out of school.  However, they do not give any actually
numbers.
The American Youth Policy Forum
http://www.aypf.org/forumbriefs/1995/fb100695.htm


This Start Program article also links chronic tardiness in elementary
and middle school with greater failure in high school.  But, it also
gives no actual statistics.
http://www.projectalliance.org/news/start_0902_print.html

This article by Effective Schools discusses tardiness as well as other
behaviors.  The web page gives directions on how to subscribed.
http://www.effectiveschools.com/free.stuff.html

There is a Paper on School Tardiness, that I kept running across.  It
sounds like it may have mover information, but it must be bought for
$49.75.  It states that it addresses some of the effects that
tardiness has on students.
http://123reports.com/categories/066-027.html

I hope these articles give you the information you were looking for.


Keywords Used: 
school tardiness research

://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=school+tardiness+research&btnG=Google+Search

http://www.schoolnurse.com/med_info/breakfast.html

I hope this helps.
PbA
Google Answers Researcher