Although school social workers (SSW's) are one of the few resources in the schools primarily designated to prevent and remediate personal and social problems that contribute to underachievement and deviant student behavior, many SSW's in Georgia are being replaced by noncertified attendance workers. Some educators claim that these attendance workers perform similar functions and cost less than certified social workers. In a study examining this claim, mailed surveys covering 10 areas of worker tasks or responsibilities were completed by 57 attendance workers and 124 certified SSW's. The ten areas covered were school attendance, assessment of children, direct services to children, services to teachers, services to parents, special education services, leadership and planning, liaison to community, liaison to human service agencies and the juvenile court, and child abuse and neglect services. The results of the survey revealed that masters level school social workers attached significantly greater importance to most of the service areas and more frequently performed tasks in most of the areas than did attendance workers. The results also showed that the majority of attendance workers' salaries were equivalent to SSW's, suggesting no economic advantage to hiring attendance workers rather than certified social workers. (NRB)