Douglas: Every school system has to budget for substitutes, and the budget in Hillsborough County, for example, amounts to $10 million. But when we asked for a school-by-school breakdown of teacher absences, neither Hillsborough nor Pinellas (where the budget is $5 million) had that information readily available. My takeaway from that and from speaking with principals and administrators is that there is some informal monitoring by principals, but it only becomes a disciplinary issue in extreme cases.

I found only about 20 disciplinary cases at the school board level so far this year for about 23,000 teachers in Hillsborough and Pinellas. No one within each school system seems to be looking closely at the big picture or searching for trouble spots in the school system.

This matters because learning suffers when teachers are absent. Substitutes in Hillsborough need only a high school diploma, and in Pinellas a two-year college degree will do. It also costs taxpayers a bundle to replace teachers in the classroom. In Hillsborough and Pinellas counties, the substitute budgets could pay for a total of 414 full-time teachers.

Tompkins: Is there a provable link between teachers/schools with high absenteeism and student achievement?

Douglas: The scientific research is limited, but there are specific studies such as the one noted above that claim to measure lower achievement. In Pinellas schools we noted that none of the schools with the highest teacher absenteeism are "A" schools as defined by the state of Florida. This link appears more pronounced at the high school level. Educators say school performance also depends on many other factors not related to teacher attendance. We cannot summarily say teachers skipping school cause failing schools. But it seems logical that if schools are failing for other reasons, it is even more important for teachers to show up for class.