In one of his saner moments, Woody Allen said, "Eighty percent of life is just showing up."

It's like that in schools, too. If the students don't show up they can't learn and teachers can't teach. When students don't learn, they sometimes fail tests, sometimes fail to be promoted and sometimes fail to turn out into the well-rounded, intelligent, compassionate people we all hoped they would be.

Surprisingly, too many students - and even some parents - fail to get that basic message.

Students are most frequently because they are sick, injured or have a family emergency. But some regularly miss Mondays and Fridays to create three-day weekends. Some declare "mental health days" with the flimsiest excuses to stay home. Some parents think nothing of pulling Johnny or Joannie out of school for a week's midwinter vacation on the slopes or at the beach with Mom and Dad.

Bright students will be able to make up the lost time easily. Average students will have to struggle to do so and poor students write their own prescription for failure. Regardless of whether they make up the missed work or not, all the students will have missed out on the explanations of the teacher, the class discussion and the insights of their classmates. Those are gone forever and no makeup work can replace them. It's also unfair to other students if the teacher has to take time from the regular lesson to catch up students with excessive absences.

Did you ever notice that the person getting the award for perfect attendance was almost always an exceptional student? That's no accident.

Because teachers and administrators and most parents know that school attendance is so critically important to academic success - not to mention learning the lessons of punctuality, reliability and commitment that are so vital in the world of work - a committee of professional educators is meeting to review and revise the Farmingdale School District's student attendance policy and to make sure it complies with all the new requirements of the New York State Education Department.

The state's object is to create a new attendance policy in which students are held accountable for their attendance, parents are aware that pulling students from school for vacations or doctor appointments must be kept to a minimum and that everybody understands that the most benefit can be derived from having every student attend class every day.

After all, parents rightly insist on good schools, good teachers and good outcomes for their children, but all of these are jeopardized by excessive absences.

Don't forget, the lessons the students learn in school about the need to show up regularly will be carried into their work lives later on. Employers lose patience very quickly with paying workers who don't show up regularly and can't be counted on to make sure the work is done.

It's a simple premise: Teachers can't teach students who aren't there. It's important for all of us, teachers, administrators, parents, the community at large, to do all that we can to assure that when class begins the students are there to learn.