<p>Students need to be in attendance at school in order to learn. One concern for schools is when students refuse to attend school on a regular basis. School refusal behavior encompasses all subsets of problematic absenteeism, such as truancy, school phobia, and anxiety. Students dealing with school refusal is a behavior that is multi-faceted. Often times, these students are experiencing psychological matters that are presenting as the symptom of school refusal. The purpose of this study was to survey general education and special education secondary teachers on their perceptions of student absences and to ascertain how they motivate students to attend their classes. The study was centered on two research questions: (1) ‘What are the perceptions of secondary teachers on student absences?’and (2) ‘Are students who exhibit school refusal behavior more likely to be identified as students with special education needs?’ The sample size for this study was 78 certified teachers at an urban high school in the Midwest. The high school had 1,834 students enrolled for the 2020/2021 school year in 9th through 12th grade, with 238 students designated as having special education services. An online survey was created using Google Forms. The survey was designed to not collect respondents’ email addresses to ensure anonymity and was limited to one response per unique email address. The survey did not ask any identifying information such as number of years teaching, subjects taught, etc. Twenty-six completed surveys were returned, for a return rate of 33%.</p>

Increasing attention is being paid to the phenomenon of school refusing behaviour. Schools and other professionals are actively working to improve student attendance however the demand for knowledge of how to work with long term absence is significant. Without proper insight the wrong actions might be taken and make the issue worse. The aim with this study is to investigate how the problems and working methods in regards to school refusal behaviour can be understood. The study is based on a literature review of 16 academic articles and the result present six main themes, central for the purpose of the study. By applying ecological development theory as well as risk and protective factor theory the study concludes that school refusal behaviour is a complex problem and the young person with school refusing behaviour needs to be holistically understood in respect to the specific life situation of the individual and risk factors need to be understood as cumulative. Proper timing and intensity of interventions are of great significance as well as interprofessional cooperation and having a good alliance with the family, all of which is concluded to be of difficulty. It is also found that school refusal behaviour to a greater extent should be considered a societal issue instead of merely an individual problem.

Denna studie syftar till att undersöka och analysera hur vårdnadshavare till barn medhemmasittarproblematik upplever samverkan mellan skola, socialtjänst och andra verksammaaktörer som berör ärendet, samt hur vårdnadshavarna upplever verksamheternas ansvar förderas barns problematik. Studiens mål är att förse en ökad förståelse för hur en sådansamverkan kan se ut och upplevs från vårdnadshavarnas perspektiv. För att utföra dennastudie hade vi en kvalitativ ansats och utförde sju semistrukturerade intervjuer medvårdnadshavare till barn med hemmasittarproblematik. Alla var utvalda efter ett målinriktaturval. Den teoretiska ansatsen för uppsatsen är systemteori. Resultatet visar att skola ochsocialtjänsten saknade kunskap och resurser för att hjälpa barn och unga medneuropsykiatriska funktionsnedsättningar. Studien har visat hur viktig kommunikation mellanbarn, vårdnadshavare och verksamheter är, samt att det finns en brist på samverkan mellanaktörer för att hjälpa hemmasittande barn. Dessutom upplevdes de sakna ansvar för barn medhemmasittarproblematik och vårdnadshavarna önskar fler insatser och mer samverkan. / The purpose of this study was to explore and analyze how guardians of children withproblematic school refusal behavior experienced the collaboration with schools, socialservices and other agencies in matters that concerned their children, as well as the guardian'sexperiences of the organization's responsibility in the matter. The study aims to be able toprovide an increased understanding of what such collaboration looked like and how it wasexperienced from the guardian’s perspective. To accomplish this study we had a qualitativeapproach and conducted seven semi structured interviews with guardians of children withproblematic school refusal behavior, all of which were chosen out of a goal-orientedselection. The chosen implemented theory for this thesis was system theory. The results ofthis study showed that schools and social services were lacking in knowledge and resourcesto help children and youth with neurodevelopmental disorders. Furthermore, they were alsolacking in responsibility for the children with problematic school refusal behavior and theguardians wished for further services with more cooperation. The thesis highlighted theimportance of communication between the child, guardians and organizations, as well as thelack of cooperation between agencies to help children with problematic school refusalbehavior.

The aim of this study was to examine how parents of children who refuse school experience the treatment they received from the school and from social services in regards to their situation, and what they believe that social services can improve in their work with these families. The study was conducted by qualitative phone interviews with six mothers of children with school refusal behavior. The main results show that the mothers were displeased with the help and treatment the school provided, but overall pleased with the help from social services although they also described room for improvements. The respondents also expressed that they had to struggle to receive help and had to make a lot of efforts themselves. Several suggestions for improvements for social services were mentioned, especially that more knowledge about school refusal and neuropsychiatric disabilities is needed in social services, and that collaboration between schools and social services should be improved. / Syftet med studien var att undersöka hur föräldrar med s.k. hemmasittande barn, det vill säga som varit frånvarande från skolan utan synbar orsak i minst tre veckor, upplever skolans och socialtjänstens agerande gentemot dem samt vad de anser att socialtjänsten eventuellt kan förbättra i arbetet med dessa familjer. Telefonintervjuer med sex mödrar till hemmasittare genomfördes. Resultaten visade på ett missnöje med skolans bemötande och hjälp medan man överlag var nöjda med socialtjänstens bemötande och hjälp även om de ansåg att det fanns utrymme för förbättringar. Ett annat starkt tema var att man ofta upplevde att deras barn inte togs på allvar utan föräldrarna fick kämpa för att få hjälp och lägga ner mycket arbete själva. Flera förbättringar för socialtjänstens arbete föreslogs, främst nämndes att mer kunskap om hemmasittare och neuropsykiatriska funktionsnedsättningar behövs samt att deras samverkan med skolan behöver förbättras.