In this series: Oregon Chronic Absenteeism.

Portland SD 1J^↗ET posted a 4.4-point improvement in a single year, dropping from 36.9% chronic absenteeism in 2024 to 32.5% in 2025.

It is the largest 2025 improvement among Oregon's 10 districts with more than 10,000 students. Portland also returned below the statewide average of 33.5% after one year above it.

Leading the big districts

Among Oregon's 10 largest districts, Portland's 4.4-point drop in 2025 stands apart. Only four of the 10 improved at all, and the next-largest gains were Eugene at 2.4 points, Salem-Keizer at 0.9 points and Gresham-Barlow at 0.2 points. The other six got worse.

Suggestive context: KATU reported that Portland Public Schools had made attendance a top priority, including attendance coaches, an ASERT support team and earlier outreach when students miss school. That does not prove those efforts caused the decline; the state data verifies the improvement, not the mechanism.

The improvement happened at scale. Portland was Oregon's largest district in the 2025 attendance file, with 41,435 students. Its chronically absent count fell by 2,068 students, from 15,544 in 2024 to 13,476 in 2025.

Below the state average

Portland's trajectory since the pandemic has been turbulent. The district's rate rose from 33.5% in 2022 to 36.4% in 2023, still below the state average, before climbing to 36.9% in 2024. That 2024 rate was 2.6 points above Oregon's 34.3% statewide rate. In 2025, Portland moved back below the state, 32.5% to 33.5%.

That crossover puts Oregon's largest district below the statewide rate in 2025. The reported counts show 2,068 fewer chronically absent students than in 2024; the data does not establish which factors produced the change.

The gap that remains

At 32.5%, Portland is still 13.6 points above its pre-COVID rate of 18.9%. The 2025 improvement is one observed year; later reporting will show whether the gap continues to narrow.

The gap is daunting but not dismissible. The 2024-to-2025 decline is the largest improvement in Portland's available attendance dataset, a real gain in a district where the post-pandemic rate had been moving in the wrong direction.

Portland's 2025 number was the largest improvement among Oregon districts with more than 10,000 students. It puts a 41,435-student urban district at the front of the state's large-district recovery for that year, while later reporting will show whether the improvement continues.

Detailed code that reproduces the analysis and figures in this article is available exclusively to EdTribune subscribers.