Roi – Alex Yarijanian

Classroom Attendance Calculator: A Tool for Monitoring Student Absences

Monitoring chronic absence data is essential for ensuring educators are equipped to support their students effectively. Amidst the busy school year, it can be easy to lose track of how absences accumulate for individual students. This is where the Classroom Attendance Calculator developed by Attendance Works comes into play. It helps educators determine whether a student’s absences place them in the satisfactory, at-risk, or chronic absence categories.

Importance of Monitoring Chronic Absences

Chronic absenteeism can significantly impact a student’s academic performance and overall well-being. Early identification of students who are frequently absent allows for timely interventions that can help mitigate the negative effects of missed school days. By regularly monitoring absence data, educators can ensure that every student receives the support they need to succeed.

Features of the Classroom Attendance Calculator

Self-Calculating Spreadsheet

The Classroom Attendance Calculator is a self-calculating spreadsheet designed to identify students who require early intervention due to excessive absences. If your district does not provide chronic absence reports, this tool can serve as an invaluable resource for tracking student attendance.

Categories of Absence

The calculator categorizes students’ absences into three groups:

Satisfactory: Students whose absences are within an acceptable range.
At-Risk: Students who are beginning to show a pattern of frequent absences.
Chronic: Students whose absences are significantly impacting their academic progress and require immediate attention.

Comprehensive Tracking

The tool prompts educators to consider both excused and unexcused absences, as well as suspensions, ensuring a comprehensive view of each student’s attendance record. This holistic approach helps in identifying patterns and understanding the reasons behind frequent absences.

Step-by-Step Guide

The calculator comes with a step-by-step guide to help educators fill in the spreadsheet accurately. This guide ensures that the data entered is consistent and reliable, providing a clear picture of each student’s attendance status.

Action Plan Worksheet

In addition to the attendance calculator, a worksheet is included for educators to assess their current strategies and identify additional measures to reduce chronic absenteeism. This reflective tool encourages educators to think critically about their approaches and develop effective action plans.

Utilizing the Attendance Calculator

To use the Classroom Attendance Calculator effectively:

Input Data: Enter each student’s absences, including excused, unexcused, and suspension days.
Review Categories: Observe which category each student falls into based on their absence record.
Develop Interventions: Use the action plan worksheet to devise strategies for supporting students with chronic absences.

By actively monitoring and addressing chronic absenteeism, educators can create a more supportive and conducive learning environment for all students. The Classroom Attendance Calculator from Attendance Works is a powerful tool that empowers educators to stay informed and take proactive steps in ensuring student success.

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Attendance Works seeks to advance student success and reduce equity gaps by reducing chronic absence. Their work includes influencing better federal, state and local policy and practices around school attendance, encouraging school districts to track chronic absence data from an early age, and partnering with families and community agencies to intervene as soon as poor attendance becomes evident for a child or school.

ROI Calculator for Partnerships to Address Social Determinants of Health

The ROI Calculator for Partnerships to Address Social Determinants of Health is a tool designed to help CBOs and their health care partners explore, structure, and plan financial arrangements to fund social services for people with complex needs. The tool allows health systems, payers, medical providers, social service providers, and CBOs to determine the overall return on investment from integrating social services with medical care under different payment models.

Healthcare organizations are increasingly partnering with community-based organizations (CBOs) to address patients’ health-related social needs such as nutrition, housing, and transportation. These partnerships can help integrate services for people with complex needs, but health care and social service organizations often struggle to establish partnerships and contracts given their different structures and financial resources.

Access the ROI Calculator for Partnerships to Address Social Determinants of Health (ROI Calculator) — designed to assist CBOs and their health care partners to explore, structure, and plan financial arrangements to fund social services for people with complex needs.

This Better Care Playbook webinar describes the application of the ROI Calculator to health care organizations and CBOs. It features a case example of a Washington State CBO that used the tool to quantify the value of their services when developing a partnership with a Medicare Advantage plan.

ROI Forecasting Calculator for Quality Initiatives

The ROI Forecasting Calculator is an excellent tool for any organization looking to improve quality while keeping costs under control. It can help identify where to make investments in quality, how to prioritize proposed initiatives, and how to demonstrate the financial benefits of investing in quality initiatives. By demonstrating potential cost savings, this tool can also help organizations identify potential areas where they can reduce costs while maintaining or improving quality.

As healthcare costs continue to rise, there is an increasing need to find ways to improve quality while keeping expenses under control. The ROI Forecasting Calculator for Quality Initiatives is a web-based tool that is designed to help state Medicaid agencies, health plans, and other stakeholders assess and demonstrate the cost-savings potential of efforts to improve quality.

The ROI Calculator is an easy-to-use tool that walks users through a step-by-step process to develop ROI forecasts for proposed quality initiatives. Users are asked to enter a variety of assumptions, including target population characteristics, program costs, and expected changes in healthcare utilization. By using these assumptions, the ROI Calculator can help determine where to make investments in quality and how to target proposed initiatives for maximum financial impact.

One of the most significant benefits of the ROI Forecasting Calculator is that it can create a financial case to policymakers for obtaining the resources needed to make those investments in the first place. By demonstrating the financial impacts of investments in quality beyond their upfront costs, the calculator can help policymakers understand the long-term benefits of investing in quality initiatives.

In addition to helping organizations make informed decisions about quality initiatives, the ROI Forecasting Calculator can also improve collaboration between stakeholders. By providing a clear picture of the financial benefits of proposed quality initiatives, the calculator can help stakeholders understand each other’s perspectives and work together to make informed decisions.

Overall, the ROI Forecasting Calculator is an essential tool for any organization looking to improve quality while keeping costs under control. By providing a clear picture of the financial benefits of proposed quality initiatives, this tool can help organizations make informed decisions, collaborate effectively, and ultimately improve the quality of care for patients.

If you’re interested in learning more about the ROI Forecasting Calculator, you can visit CHCSROI.org to access the tool and start forecasting potential savings. Don’t wait; start using this powerful tool to improve quality and control costs today!

Return on Investment Calculator (R.O.I.) for College Mental Health Services and Programs

The tool is easy to use and only requires a handful of questions about your institution, including enrollment size, approximate institutional drop-out rate, and approximate per student tuition rate. Based on this information, the calculator will give economic estimates for both your institution and students.

This tool will allow you to calculate the economic returns of services or programs that improve mental health in your student population.

You will be asked a handful of questions about your campus, including:

Enrollment size
Approximate institutional drop-out rate
Approximate per student tuition rate

Based on the information you provide, the calculator will give economic estimates for both your institution and students.

Your proposed services or programs could be focused on mental health treatment or could also seek to prevent mental health issues. They could be new or expanded offerings that your campus is considering, or they could be existing services.

The calculator’s estimates are based on research by the Healthy Minds Network. This research examined how depressive symptoms predict student persistence in college. The estimates, therefore, are most accurate for services and programs that specifically reduce depressive symptoms. The estimates may also extend to services and programs that address other mental health concerns, such as anxiety. The original research article with more details is available here as well as the Healthy Minds website.

Access the calculator here.

Supporting breastfeeding employees is good for business

Business case for breast-feeding

Breastfeeding employees miss work less often

Business Savings: One-day absences to care for sick children occur more than twice as often for mothers of formula feeding infants.1

Breastfeeding lowers healthcare cost 2,3

Business Savings: The insurance company CIGNA conducted a 2-year study of 343 employees who participated in their lactation support program, and found that the program resulted in an annual savings of $240,000 in health care expenses, 62 percent fewer prescriptions, and $60,000 savings in reduced absenteeism rates.4

Investing in a worksite lactation support program can yield substantial dividends to the company.

Lower Turnover Rates

Business Savings: Studies have shown companies with lactation support programs have retention rates of between 83% and 94% compared to the national average of only 59%5,6,7

Additional Health Care Savings

Business Savings: Mutual of Omaha found that health care costs for newborns are three times lower for babies whose mothers participate in their company’s maternity and lactation program. Per person health care costs were $2,146 more for employees who did not participate in the program, with a yearly savings of $115,881 in health care claims for the breastfeeding mothers and babies.1

Higher Productivity and Loyalty 8

Business Savings: The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power found that a lactation support program for mothers, fathers, and partners of male employees made a dramatic difference in reducing turnover and absenteeism rates for both male and female workers. Employees felt more positive about the company as a result of the program and 67% intended to make it their long term employer. 9

Companies with worksite lactation support programs enjoy positive public relations.

What are the components of a successful Worksite Lactation Program?

A comprehensive program that includes the following four components has been shown in business environments to provide the greatest return on investment:

1. Privacy for mothers to express milk.
This can be a woman’s private office (if it can be locked) or an onsite, designated lactation room with an electrical outlet where breastfeeding employees can use a pump to express milk during the work period.
2. Flexible breaks
Women need to express milk about every 3 hours, or two to three times during a typical work day. Each milk expression time takes around 15 minutes, plus time to go to and from the lactation room.
3. Education
Employer-provided information and resources accessible through the worksite during pregnancy and after the baby is born help prepare women for balancing the requirements for breastfeeding with their job responsibilities. This information is also beneficial for expectant fathers. Companies that provide lactation information and support for male employees and their partners have lower absenteeism rates among men and lower health insurance claims.
4. Support
A positive, accepting attitude from upper management, supervisors, and coworkers helps breastfeeding employees feel confident in their ability to continue working while breastfeeding.

References:

1. Cohen R, Mrtek MB & Mrtek RG. (1995). Comparison of maternal absenteeism and infant illness rates among breastfeeding and formula-feeding women in two corporations. American Journal of Health Promotion, 10 (2), 148-153.

2. Ball T & Wright A. (1999). Health care costs of formula- feeding in the first year of life. Pediatrics, 103 (4), 871-876.

3. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (2007). Breastfeeding and maternal and infant health outcomes in developed countries. Evidence report, Technology Assessment, Number 153.

4. Dickson V, Hawkes C, Slusser W, Lange L, & Cohen R. (2000). The positive impact of a corporate lactation program on breastfeeding initiation and duration rates: help for the working mother. Unpublished manuscript. Presented at the Annual Seminar for Physicians, co-sponsored by the American Academy of Pediatrics, American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and La Leche League International, on July 21, 2000.

5. Mutual of Omaha. (2001). Prenatal and lactation education reduces newborn health care costs. Omaha, NE: Mutual of Omaha

6. Ortiz, J, McGilligan K, & Kelly P. (2004). Duration of breast milk expression among working mothers enrolled in an employer-sponsored lactation program. Pediatric Nursing, 30(2):111-119.

7. EEO Trust. (2001). New Zealand’s Best Employers in Work and Life 2001. Auckland, NZ.

8. Galtry J. (1997). Lactation and the labor market: breastfeeding, labor market changes, and public policy in the United States. Health Care Women Int., 18, 467-480.

9. Cohen R, Lange L & Slusser W. (2002). A description of a male-focused breastfeeding promotion corporate lactation program. Journal of Human Lactation, 18(1), 61-65.

10. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2005) Division of Labor Force Statistics, Washington, D.C. Available at: http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/famee.pdf

11. National Immunization Survey. (2005). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Available online at: http://www.cdc.gov/ breastfeeding/data/NIS_data/data_2005.htm 12. Slusser W. et al. (2004). Breast milk expression in the. workplace: a look at frequency and times. Journal of Human Lactation 20(2):164-169.

12. The Business Case for Breastfeeding Toolkit (2011) Department of Health and Human Services, USA. Available at: http://www.womenshealth.gov/breastfeeding/government-in-action/business-case-for-breastfeeding/