Student attendance in K-12 schools is strongly associated with critical educational outcomes such as student achievement and graduation rates. Yet, the factors that contribute to chronic absenteeism are complex, with environmental, non-structural (student/family), and structural (school-based) factors all potentially affecting the likelihood of a student attending school regularly. This exploratory study uses school-level data to understand the problem of chronic absenteeism in Detroit traditional public and charter schools. Our findings suggest a significant relationship between school climate and chronic absenteeism in traditional public schools, but not in charter schools, in Detroit. In traditional public schools, schools with stronger organizational climate as measured by the UChicago Consortium on School Research 5Essentials have lower chronic absenteeism rates, while controlling for student demographics and grade levels. More research is needed to understand the structural factors that contribute to chronic absenteeism in charter schools.