The United States is facing a high school dropout crisis. One of the early warning indicators of high school dropout is chronic absenteeism. This mixed-methods, post-hoc, hermeneutic, descriptive design study seeks to investigate the reported and self-reported attendance barriers for overage, under-credited (OU), at-risk, urban high school youth in a synchronous online learning environment during COVID-19. This approach allowed for a deeper understanding of the complex humanistic nuances regarding attendance barriers for OU youth; furthermore, it allowed the researcher to develop an interwoven counter-narrative to contrast the existing master-narrative for OU youth built primarily on predisposed risk factors and racial stereotyping. Utilizing two data collection instruments (attendance log entries from the school information system and a school-wide survey), two distinct groups of students were represented in this study: 1) chronically absent students and 2) frequently attending students. Results of the analysis suggest that barriers such as technology accessibility and comfort, family obligations, work responsibilities, and motivation were the leading factors contributing to attendance issues in an online learning environment. These results underscore important implications for flexible schedules that give credit for work completed with less of an emphasis on strict "sign-in" hours, such as an asynchronous learning model. Additional implications include the need for individualized schedule options based on students' work-school-home life balance, access to a hybrid learning model, and/or access to an integrative community-based care model through school-based programming opportunities. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]