Finding a resolution to the absenteeism problem is important in terms of children's development. It is necessary that the risk of absenteeism is determined in an early stage and an early warning system is established to prevent absenteeism. For this reason, development of an assessment tool was targeted.
Methods: A qualitative research design was carried out at the first stage of the study. During this research procedure, 97 teachers, 53 administrators, 73 elementary school students who hadleft school, and 76 of their parents who were selected to represent the overall structure of the population in Turkey were included in the study. With the information retrieved from this research, a scale named the Risk Assessment Form (RIDEF) was developed. RIDEF consists of 111 questions within 9 risk categories. The second stage of the study was carried out with 3871 students studying in 21 schools from 5 different cities, which were selected at the first stage. While 49.5% (n=1924) of the students were between the ages of 7 and 12, 48% (n=1859) of the students were between 13 to 16 years of age. The mean age was 12.27±1.87 years. The mean of days of unexcused absences of those students within the 2009-2010 academic year, during which time this research was implemented, was 6.62±8.93 days and the mean of days of their unexcused absences the year before was 6.08±7.21 days. At the second stage, the RIDEF was applied to the same students 15 days after the first application and also a different interviewer filled the form for half of the students. The School Atmosphere Scale was applied during the study, as well.
Results: When the total score derived from the scale was compared with the Pearson correlation analysis the interrater reliability was found as r= 0.96 (p<0.01). Test – re-test reliability was determined as r= 0.85 (p<0.01). Based on the risk indicators obtained from RIDEF, the Cronbach alpha validity of the scale was calculated as 0.79. When any item is removed from the scale, the value of the internal consistency coefficient varies between 0.77 and 0.79. It has been observed that there is a statistically significant level of correlation between the School Atmosphere Scale and RIDEF sub-scales (r=0.51, p=0.001). As a result of the analysis, categorized risk indicators were grouped under two factors, which accounted for 44.73% of the total variance with eigen values over one. The first factor, consisting of 4 items grouped under the title of individual problems related to childhood, explains 30.98% of the variance and the second factor, consisting of 5 items with the title social and economic problems related to the family, accounts for 13.75% of the variance. The mean scores of the risk points derived from all of the categories showed a statistically significant difference between students with high and low levels of absenteeism. Discussion: This research study showed that the RIDEF is a reliable and valid scale in determining the risk of absenteeism.