State and national school accountability policies situate preventing chronic absenteeism on par with meeting state standardized test benchmarks. We question relying on school attendance as both a component of accountability policies and a means of enhancing equity in schools. Our research suggests out-of-school factors unrelated to missed instruction account for most of the associations between absences and test score achievement--with unexcused absences driving those associations. Excessive absences--and particularly unexcused absences--do not harm students mainly through missed instruction. Instead, they reflect out-of-school harms students endure that have produced inequalities for years--and will continue to do so even if students show up or parents call in.