1. Urge Parents to Keep Students at Home When Ill Throughout history, teachers have urged children and parents to strive for perfect attendance during the school year. Many schools even hand out perfect attendance awards at the end of the year. Encouraging children to attend school every day is a good idea, in theory, to ensure children do not miss important school lessons that may lead to them having to play catch up later when they do return to the classroom. However, awarding children for perfect school attendance has become controversial due to the fact that these awards unintentionally encourage children to attend school when ill. Unfortunately, when just one child with influenza attends school due to a desire to earn this award, this child can infect many others and begin an entire flu epidemic in your school.