Networked Learning with Attendance Teams

Talent Development Secondary (TDS) at the Tides Center provided technical assistance and professional learning to the Carlsbad Municipal School District Attendance Team during SY2526. TDS has also developed an understanding and rapport with district leadership focused on attendance improvement at Gadsden Independent School District (ISD) while providing support to the New Mexico Public Education Department Attendance Improvement program. Both districts share a similar structure – an attendance team that includes district and campus level positions – that lead to TDS planning and facilitating a site visit to Santa Teresa High School in Gadsden, New Mexico on Friday, April 17, 2026. TDS brought together attendance teams and Multi-Layered system of support (MLSS*) staff from Gadsden ISD and Carlsbad Municipal Schools to create a space for meaningful collaboration and shared learning among educators, attendance teams, and leaders. An overall goal for facilitating this visit was to create an opportunity to share and dig deeper into research and evidence based practices. The primary objectives of the visit were to explore the following topics together:

• Layer I and II strategies that strengthen peer to peer and peer to adult relationships 
• The use of qualitative and quantitative data to drive student success systems to improve student attendance and course passing rates 
• Gathering and making meaning of qualitative data with school teams 
• District attendance team structure, roles and how they spend their time 
• Building and sustaining your team 
• Aligning MLSS with Student Success Systems
• Soliciting and leveraging student voice from a subset of students

Through open dialogue and observation, participants engaged in conversations centered on continuous improvement, with a focus on identifying effective strategies that can be replicated and challenges that can be addressed collectively with the resources currently available.

The visit was designed to encourage reflection and knowledge sharing. Participants engaged in collaborative conversations among role groups, creating space to exchange ideas, discuss successes, and explore solutions to common challenges. These interactions fostered a spirit of partnership and reinforced the value of learning networks that support growth and innovation. As Rosy Villalobos, Associate Superintendent for Federal Programs at Gadsden ISD, said, “We are on this journey together”. Rosy expressed a desire to continue the collaboration to better serve students now and in the future. Tam Garriott from Carlsbad Municipal Schools echoed this sentiment, saying, “I hope we can continue to support one another and learn together! I am proud to know you all a little better!”

Student voice played a key role in the process, with a student focus group of high school students who are also learning English, providing valuable insight through thoughtfully developed questions to help the adults on campus deepen their understanding of the experience of multi-language learners in their school. TDS modeled the empathy focus group with multi language learners who are struggling with attendance as one way to gather qualitative data. The students were candid in their responses and provided honest, valuable feedback about their educational experiences. One student shared the unique challenges of commuting to and from school daily in the borderlands between New Mexico and Mexico, and how addressing this root cause of their attendance issues put them on the path to timely graduation. All students shared the important role that feeling a sense of belonging plays in their attendance.

Discussions around attendance practices generated important questions for future exploration, including whether a consistent attendance audit process is being implemented across all schools, and how the districts can collaborate on implementation of a system of attendance tools to improve attendance and tier 1 interventions. Overall, the site visit was a successful experience that highlighted the power of collaboration, student voice, and shared problem-solving in advancing educational excellence.

*Multi-layered system of support (MLSS) is similar to Multi-tiered system of support (MTSS)