Supporting Student Attendance
Through Mental Well-Being
Strategies for school leaders to nurture cultures where mental well-being can flourish and wrap-around supports help students who are struggling attend, engage, and thrive.
The Legal Foundation
Ontario law establishes the obligation to attend school — and gives principals the tools to accommodate students when mental health is the barrier.
Under Section 21(1) of the Education Act, students must attend school from age 6 until age 18. Bill 52 (2006) raised the age from 16 to 18 and introduced the concept of "equivalent learning" — acknowledging that for some students, flexible pathways beyond traditional classroom instruction may be needed.
When a student can't attend due to a mental health concern, their absence must be excused under s. 21(2)(b) as "sickness or other unavoidable cause." PPM 169 advises that principals may wish to work closely with their board's Mental Health Leader on attendance related to mental health. Principals can also temporarily excuse attendance under Regulation 298, s. 23(3), at the written request of a parent or adult student. The goal is always to support the student's return — not to simply excuse absence indefinitely.
Welcome & Include
Students attend when they feel they belong. SMHO's Aligned and Integrated Model (AIM) starts here: welcoming, inclusive school environments where mental health promotion is embedded into daily practice, not treated as a standalone program.
Every student needs to know and feel that they belong. This means building school and classroom environments that affirm diverse identities, foster genuine relationships between students and caring adults, and create daily opportunities for meaningful connection. When students feel connected, they are more motivated to attend.
The physical space of a school communicates values. Welcoming entrances, calm spaces for regulation, inclusive displays, and thoughtful classroom arrangements all contribute to a student's sense of psychological safety — a precondition for attendance and learning.
Mental health should be part of the school's everyday language and culture, not something addressed only in crisis. Principals set this tone. When school leaders model openness about well-being and normalize conversations about mental health, students are more likely to seek help early rather than withdraw.
Understand & Promote
Building mental health literacy equips students, educators, and families to recognize concerns early and respond effectively. Research shows that systematic, active, and focused social-emotional skill instruction also improves academic outcomes (Durlak et al., 2011).
PPM 169 requires school boards to implement teacher-led, culturally responsive mental health literacy modules for students in Grades 7 and 8 (aligned with Health and Physical Education curriculum) and for students enrolled in the Grade 10 Career Studies course. These modules help students learn about mental health and mental illness, build awareness of stigma, and develop strategies for managing stress and knowing when and where to seek help.
Schools can teach concrete strategies: breathing exercises, thought challenging (replacing anxious thoughts with more balanced ones), problem-solving, and goal-setting. SMHO emphasizes practising calming strategies during non-anxious times so students have tools available when anxiety arises. These are skills that directly support a student's capacity to attend.
Experiencing difficult emotions is a normal part of adolescence. SMHO advises that if a change in behaviour, emotions, or thoughts lasts more than two weeks, is causing distress, and is negatively affecting day-to-day living, it is time to seek further support. Teaching students and families this guideline helps them distinguish typical fluctuations from emerging concerns.
Notice the Signs
Early identification is a critical bridge between universal promotion and targeted support. Often, the classroom teacher is the first to notice a concern — but any staff member, parent, or the student themselves may identify the need for more support.
School Mental Health Ontario identifies common signs of concerning anxiety in students. These include:
SMHO recommends that educators attend to two key dimensions when monitoring student behaviour. Intensity: Are emotional reactions or behaviours disproportionate to the situation — signs of extreme sadness, anxiety, anger, or aggression? Duration: Have concerning patterns persisted for more than a few weeks? Separately, SMHO's general guideline advises that if changes in behaviour, emotions, or thoughts last more than two weeks, cause distress, and negatively affect day-to-day living, it is time to seek further support. Together, these lenses help educators distinguish between typical adolescent fluctuations and emerging mental health concerns.
Educators are not mental health professionals. Their role is to observe, document specific behaviours, and connect students with appropriate support. SMHO also reminds educators to reflect on beliefs and biases that may influence how they perceive a student's emotions, and to base observations on specifics rather than generalizations.
When Students Can't Come
School avoidance is not truancy. When anxiety is the cause of absence, the student experiences school as threatening. This requires a qualitatively different response than traditional attendance interventions.
SMHO's guidance is clear: when anxiety causes absence, best practice is to encourage attendance even for short periods every day. Avoiding school only makes it harder to return.
It is important to acknowledge a student's feelings as real and understandable while also being honest that skipping school is likely to make things harder, not easier. SMHO's guidance is to validate the underlying emotion, not the avoidance behaviour. For instance, a teacher might recognize that a student feels overwhelmed about a presentation while also gently communicating that avoiding class will make the next presentation more difficult.
SMHO recommends ensuring a support person is available to quietly welcome the student to school and check in during the day. When a student is returning after absence, develop a transition plan collaboratively with the student and family. This may include a gradual return process, temporarily reduced academic expectations, and identification of key adults the student feels comfortable with.
For students experiencing anxiety-related attendance challenges, SMHO recommends: limiting timed tasks and other stressful academic demands; chunking assignments into manageable pieces with encouragement for attempting work; correcting errors in the context of praise and support; giving ample notice for tests and deadlines; and setting realistic expectations collaboratively, including the student wherever possible.
Students may also avoid school because a situation at the school is affecting their well-being, such as bullying or experiences of racism. These situations require a fundamentally different response — one that addresses the environment, not the student's coping. SMHO stresses the importance of identifying the reason for avoidance in order to support the student effectively.
Mobilize Your Team
Schools are not meant to do this work alone. Ontario has built a layered infrastructure of school-based and system-level mental health supports that principals can — and should — activate.
Every Ontario school board has funded positions at the secondary level for school mental health professionals. Most boards employ regulated professionals such as school social workers, psychologists, and psychological associates, who are trained to deliver evidence-informed preventive interventions and can provide guidance on student-specific support strategies. When a student's attendance is affected by mental health, these are key partners.
Every school board has a Mental Health Leader (typically a senior clinician) and a Superintendent with shared responsibility for the board's mental health strategy and action plan. These leaders can support principals with guidance on programming selection, community partnerships, and alignment with the board's mental health strategy.
Schools are ideally positioned for promotion, prevention, and early intervention — but they are not ideally suited to provide intensive therapeutic intervention. When students need more than school-based services can offer, staff help connect them and their families with community or healthcare supports, while continuing to reinforce skills and strategies in the school setting. Some students will not or cannot access clinical services but still come to school — in these cases, school staff and families coordinate to wrap around supports as best they can.
The Principal's Role
Principals are responsible for nurturing school cultures where mental well-being can flourish. This means leading with intention across every tier of support.
Make mental well-being a visible and daily priority in the school, not an initiative reserved for awareness weeks or crisis moments. When principals consistently model openness, check in with staff and students, and allocate time and resources to well-being, they establish norms that make it safer for struggling students to ask for help — and to keep attending.
Ensure all staff understand the attendance and mental health provisions in Ontario law, can recognize early signs of mental health concerns, and know the pathways for connecting students with support. Professional learning on mental health literacy and early identification is part of the principal's responsibility to build a responsive school team.
Create and communicate clear pathways from classroom observation, to school mental health professional consultation, to community referral. When these pathways are understood by all staff, students receive support more quickly and consistently.
SMHO's "By Your Side" section for parents and caregivers positions families as collaborators in supporting student mental health. Principals can foster this partnership by maintaining open communication, co-developing transition plans for students returning from absence, and connecting families with community resources.
The Ontario Ministry of Education defines persistent or chronic absenteeism as any student who has missed 10% or more of school days for any reason, including unexcused or excused absences, over an academic year. Tracking attendance patterns — not just individual absences — can reveal emerging mental health concerns before they become entrenched. Early identification of attendance problems is critical; the probability of successful intervention increases when referrals are made before absence becomes chronic or habitual.
Community Resources
When students need support beyond what schools can provide, these community partners offer accessible, evidence-informed services. Principals should ensure staff and families know these pathways exist.
Canada's only 24/7 e-mental health service for young people. Free, bilingual (English/French), and confidential support by phone, text, and live chat. Their "Resources Around Me" tool helps locate local services anywhere in Canada.
Walk-in, low-barrier mental health services for youth and families at hub locations across Ontario. Designed to bring the right services to young people at the right time and in the right place.
A network of publicly funded child and youth mental health centres with 4,000 professionals across Ontario. Offers free counselling and treatment — in person, by phone, and virtually. No referral or OHIP card required.
Free single-session counselling for children and youth. Provides immediate access to mental health support and direct referral to additional services when needed, through an integrated network of child and youth mental health agencies across Ontario.
Specialized support for students whose identities shape their experience and their needs:
