School Absences due to Illness

Parent Q&A

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  • After a mild bout of covid 5 months ago, my daughter developed symptoms of long covid (exhaustion, pains, brain fog, insomnia, etc). Among other things, we are struggling to keep her in school as she's often too exhausted. Are there any families out there who are dealing with long covid in their kids or conditions like ME/CFS? We are trying to figure out what accommodations she needs at her current school as well as exploring options like independent study, remote learning and homeschooling. We'd also like to connect with other families in similar situations to share resources and knowledge. My daughter is currently enrolled in an independent school and we live in Berkeley Unified. Any advice, tips or guidance would be deeply appreciated. 

    BUSD has a program called Home Hospital where your child meets one on one with a teacher 3-5 hours weekly and then does what they can in terms of homework. The teacher has full ability to award credits and grades as they see fit. In our case our child got several classes completed in a few months with excellent grades which saved her from falling far behind. You just have to register her at BUSD and request this with a doctors statement I believe 

    Hi there. I'm so sorry to hear about your daughter. We have been struggling with the same thing and the challenges are multitude. Navigating schooling is so difficult. Our daughter was at BHS and we kept getting truancy warnings because schools don't know how to handle this situation. It's a nightmare. Our daughter was able to attend fall of freshman year then the post-exertional malaise set in and she had to be in Home and Hospital Education in the spring. Repeat situation in Sophomore year. Schooling and moving forward is very important for their mental health but few schools know how to handle this situation. You do need to get a 504, but even with that, making up for school gets overwhelming and the stress of missing school doesn't help, in our experience. I am happy to talk and would love to find more parents with children going through this. It's not school refusal, anxiety or depression. I'll email you separately to connect. If anyone else wants to discuss this, please reach out to me.

    I don't know about private school accommodations, but in public school you can ask for a 504 plan. Depending on the level of her disability you could also ask for a home teacher. Contact DREDF and speak to a parent advocate to get help with the process, and with figuring out what to ask for.

    Hi there. I'm sorry your family is going through this, it's a bumpy road. My daughter has a condition that looks the same, just from a different infection. We chose to get a 504 so they can flex the work as needed. There are no enforcers of a 504 (unlike an IEP) however it was easier to change course as her health improved or declined. With a 504 she was able to go on home/hospital status and the teacher came to our house and if she was feeling better, the workload increased, when her symptoms flared, there was less work. No making up to keep up with traditional classes - bound for failure. The teacher created the work that that was appropriate. When it came to science, there were online labs and home projects. We had an advocate at our 504 meetings to ensure the district took her accommodations seriously. She was determined to get a HS diploma, not a GED and her graduation was one of the proudest days ever. Let me know if you want to talk more about this. 

  • Did anyone had similar experience with your children or any HS counselors here who could advise? 

    What would you do?

    My HS Sophomore daughter had always been an A student, rare Bs. Last semester she got sick and condition worsened significantly so she no longer was able to attend school and missed plenty of classes especially during her last period (Chemistry). Her doctor recommended to stay home on Home Hospital but since all of her classes were college prep, honors or AP, school couldn’t provide the instructor for Home Hospital and instead gave her Incomplete in 4 subjects and she was supposed to submit the missing assignments until Feb 16 which she did with a lot of difficulty in 3 subjects. 

    The exception is Chemistry class where she has time until May to submit everything and take the final exam. 

    In Spring Semester she changed to online program, so will not continue Chemistry because it is not available online. I hired tutor but she is still too sick to do extra work, has difficulty keeping up even with her current online assignments, so trying to self-teach chemistry after mussing almost half of the semester is an impossible task.  

    Principal has no empathy and does not allow her to drop last semester’s chemistry because when she got sick it was past the due date for dropping. They allow to drop only during the first 2 weeks of the semester but she got sick after that. I spoke with counselor, teacher, VP and Principal multiple times and they have her medical documentation. 

    Principal told he will not allow to drop the class after the due date because “dropping classes doesn’t look good on school statistics, and that she should submit all work and take final exam otherwice her grade will turn into F”. She is too sick to do it now and needs to focus on healing rather then extra pressure of that. 

    I feel it is unfair to punish the hardworking child for getting sick on the wrong week of the semester by giving her failing grade and ruining her GPA and college opportunities. Principal mentioned initially an option for “No mark grade” in the transcript but then declined it. 

    What would you do?

    Sounds like your child currently has a disability and she is not being granted appropriate accommodations.   There are organizations which help disabled students.   Dredf , Disability Rights and Education Fund might help guide you.  If she is too sick to do the work and they are giving her an F, then it sounds like discrimination.   You might call the special ed department of the school or district, the superintendent, or seek legal counsel.   My child had a concussion which caused such headaches if he tried to concentrate, he would vomit but he looked and seemed alright otherwise, and it was hard to convince the school it was real.  Using disability rights language, plus lots of documentation helped us.  You might have to go further.  Start with DREDF.

    First, I wish you and your daughter the best in her recovery. Sadly, her school is adding idiotic red tape to your otherwise enormous load in caring for your hardworking child & it's unacceptable. I'd waste no time in going to the District & School Board representatives armed with a lawyer. It sounds like the VP & P are behaving like they are bound by the old fallback "if we do it for your kid we will have to do it for everyone" protocol.  Read through your parent handbook they give out each year. There's a lot of information there that gets overlooked. Know your rights & find an advocate. You are being treated unfairly.  Good luck to you both. 

    This is ridiculous. Escalate this to the principal's supervisor and contact the District Ombudsman. (That said, I don't think her performance that semester will impact her college opportunities because you can easily write a letter to explain why she was unable to attend school that semester.) But still, they should allow her to drop the classes given the circumstances.

    I will just add some additional input:

    If you can not get the class dropped and the school winds up giving her an F, it is not the end of her academic life.

    It is an opportunity to write one heck of a great essay to colleges about a challenge she met which was beyond her control and would show how amazing she is as a student.!  

    I am an original poster. Thank you very much for everyone who replied. I really appreciate all tge advice.  

    Can anyone recommend a parent advocate or an educational attorney you personally worked with? 

Archived Q&A and Reviews



School harassing my kid for absences

April 2009

My daughter has a few chronic health issues, severe cramps, migraines, and joint pain. She hates to miss school but these conditions have caused her to miss about 2 days each month. She has made up the schoolwork for the most part and is at B's and C's in her classes right now. She is really trying to up the grades at least to B's before the end of the year. The problem is the pressure she is getting from her teachers. I normally fully support teachers and the school but she has been getting some inappropriate comments and attitude from them. One teacher implied that she missed school on purpose to avoid a test. Another said she will flunk out of Freshman classes next year if she is absent the same amount. (As if thinking about High School is not stressfull enough!). Then yesterday she was in the office and making a phonecall to her dad to ask that he bring some Advil to school because she was getting her cramps (I am talking pale in the face, throwing up from the pain cramps). One of her teachers spotted her and told her ''You'd better not be calling home 'sick''' using air quotes for ''sick''. She was in tears about this last night. So what is the deal with this school and the teachers? Is it the XX dollars that they miss out on when a kid is sick? Do I need to get a doctor excuse whenever she is sick? If they think she is faking, why don't they call me to talk about it? What do parents of kids with even more serious chronic conditions do? Do I need to yank her out of public schools and do home schooling? Thanks for letting me rant. Anonymous


Every year we would attend Back to School night and each year the principal gave the same talk, she once pointed to my husband and me and said that we could give this talk as well as she could because after 4 kids through her school we'd heard it often;-) She said something profound... she told a story of a parent walking by a classroom, seeing a teacher jumping on a desk and screaming at the kids... horrified the parent went immediately to the office to report the incident. The teacher being a petite thing, was standing on the desktops teaching the children dance steps yelling over the music. The principal promised ''I will only believe half of what your children tell me about you, if you afford me the same courtesy''

If your child is sick and misses school, the school doesn't get the monies from the state regardless of whether it's an excused absence; not sure if you've noticed but our schools are desperately underfunded. I think a huge part of this falls on you actually; for not communicating to the school, teachers and principal what the issues with your daughter are. Missing two days a month, is actually a lot of absences if you think of it quarterly or as a semester.

When our daughter was suffering from something; we immediately called her high school counselor and talked with her teachers to let them know what she was experiencing and what needed to be done. We did actually provide a note from the doctor. my 4 cents


First, I would like to recommend that you have your daughter assessed for fibromyalgia by a rheumatologist. Her symptoms sound a lot like my daughter's, who has FM as well as chronic immune system disorder, and as a consequence missed a fair amount of school. Second, I think that your daughter is suffering the usual fate of people with invisible disabilities. Many people assume that if they can't see that something is wrong, then nothing is wrong. The behavior of the teachers is inexcusable. You might talk to them, explain the situation, and say that your daughter is doing the best she can and that you would appreciate their support. It might not solve the problem, but it might start to educate them. Good luck to both you and your daughter. Jenifer


Sounds like you are expecting too much of the school. I know--my daughter is in her fourth year of public high school and I still haven't gotten used to the difference between it and her wonderful years in private school. That said, if you haven't already, you need to set up meeting(s) with the teachers and an administrator to get them on board with your daughter's issues, and you need to do this each year, or maybe even each semester. I would also recommend that if any of the health issues are new that you work on whether they could be triggered by school/class/test anxiety. With a complete picture, possibly including statements from her doctors, you should be more successful with the school. anon


Well, I'm sure you've been doing all you can to help your daughter medically because it sounds just awful! I would email all the teachers individually, and an administrator or counselor, to let them know what's going on. I don't think you can expect them to contact you (especially not in high school!). Ask your daughter to make sure she asks for the make-up work and to see if she can schedule times to retest if she's going to miss one. Also, let the teachers know that you would like to keep in touch with them about how she's doing. This is to show that you are a concerned parent, and hopefully, will bring up a sense of compassion in them for your daughter. You may need a medical note, but I wouldn't think that you would need it every time she's absent. If it's still a problem in high school you might need to do more to make sure she's staying on top of the work. Good luck! And I hope these health issues are temporary. anon


I had the same problems in HS, so did my daughter.

However she went to private school and they did hassle her a bit, but they also had a nurse and a quiet room where she could lie down with a heating pad, and then she could go back to class. She would call me to pick her up early and I had a doctor's note on file, which I would back up with a phone call when she had to miss the last class in the day.

I suggest seeing your MD, there are medications. Also I found Yoga helped. My daughter got relief by playing soccer. Some people like swimming. Threatening her will only increase the tension that makes the cramps worse. Maybe get a lawyer to write a letter. Both parents if available need to make an appointment and visit the school teacher(s) and administrators. If you have any officious relatives bring them too. Schools tend to pay attention when adult family members show up dressed in business attire with note-taking materials if not an audio or video recorder.

Parse the problem out - your daughter needs to get some relief with the physical issues - keep working with a doctor, a chiropractor, acupuncture whatever it takes. Let the teachers know you are working on the issues and they can choose to be part of the solution or one of the problems. Don't loose it front of them, but be very clear and strong. Also volunteer at the school as much as possible. Very hard to mess with the volunteers' kids. If you have the money buy classroom supplies. Secrets to life. well wisher


This is infuriating behavior from the staff and there's a way to put a stop to it. Contact the school's counselor or psychologist. Tell him or her you believe she has a medical disability interfering with her schoolwork.

My daughter has medical and emotional problems that caused her to miss a substantial amount of school too. She qualified for an Individual Education Plan (IEP) because of ''other health impairment'' (her chronic daily headaches and executive function deficits) and ''emotional disturbance'' (depression and anxiety).

As soon as you tell the school you suspect a disability, a series of legal protections kicks in, including psychoeducational testing. The school must come up with a plan for addressing her physical and emotional needs, including accommodations for her health problems. Call the Disability Rights and Education Fund (DREDF) in Berkeley for further information about your legal and civil rights in this situation. We worked with Ann McDonald-Cacho, who educated and strategized with us about how to deal with the school.

I'm an RN and also recommend you have a pediatrician check her, if you haven't already. If you've already seen a pediatrician, ask him or her about the possibility of an ''endocrine or gynecological consult''. There are medicines available to treat the menstrual problems that torment your child. Best wishes. Nancy