12A THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
NEWS
1...
MONDAY, AUGUST 16, 2004
Truancy troubles lead to creative solutions
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
SAN FRANCISCO — As a 40-year-old former teacher, Chris Lazzaro has found a fresh line of work in education. His job is to make sure the back-to-school season never ends.
In San Francisco's new fight against school absenteeism, Lazzaro monitors who is cutting classes at a middle school and a high school where truancy runs high.
He makes sure daily attendance records are accurate and he goes after persistently absent students, reminding their parents or guardians that state law requires the children to show up.
"Often times, parents have been a little bit angry, like I'm bothering them," Lazzaro said of his unannounced house calls. "Or I'll find a child sitting there alone, half-dressed, eating cereal and watching TV. I'll say, 'Get your clothes on, and get to school.' It can be very difficult, but you have to keep persevering to get the students back."
Truancy has long troubled many schools, particularly in urban areas. In a survey this year, nearly half of middle and high school teachers described truancy as a serious problem.
The consequences are clear. Absent students slip behind in academics and get into legal trouble. Schools with high numbers of truants can lose a community's trust and millions of dollars in student aid.
Federal education law requires states to start reporting truancy figures for every school, not just for districts or regions. And attendance is factored into whether many schools make enough progress to avoid landing on the "needs improvement" list, a designation that can force them to let students transfer elsewhere.
Still, truancy remains a second-tier concern, said Tony Woollen, a juvenile detective in Leawood, Kan., who is secretary of the National Association of School Resource Officers.
At a recent conference, Woollen asked 50 school-based police officers about truancy in their schools. Three-quarters said they had no programs in place to address the problem. Most said their priority is stopping gang activity, bullying and sex offenses at school.
president of the Education Commission of the States Clearinghouse, which tracks education policies.
Every state requires school attendance, yet some do not enforce those laws aggressively or cannot do so because the laws are vague, said Kathy Christie, vice
The best way to deal with the problem, Woollen said, is to find a community approach.
School districts have tried, with mixed success, incentives and penalties to get students back. These include student-tracking ID cards, parenting classes, special re-entry classes, truancy courts and grandparent patrols, as well as parties and concerts to reward attendance.
"Any kid growing up is going to be pushing on the walls to see what they can get away with," he said. "If the solid walls aren't there, from the school district, the police department, the community, then why should the child go to school? But with a team concept, it doesn't matter which of the walls they push on. They're all
Beyond students who see classes as having little relevance to their lives, some students miss school to take care of a sibling or earn money for their family. Others skip to avoid harassment or physical abuse by other students, or the public embarrassment of being behind academically.
And some students just would rather not do the work.
Yet parents also get reminders of the potential penalties once students become habitual truants after the sixth unexcused absence. These include fines and reduced welfare aid for parents, and the revocation of driver's licenses for older students.
The district has created a stay-in-school coalition, drawing in help from many sources, from the mayor's office to the housing authority. It has added specialists such as Lazzaro, called attendance liaisons, in the neediest schools. Parents get letters, calls, visits and offers of help as absences mount. The goal is to have an answer for every obstacle or excuse that comes up.
That's what the San Francisco Unified School District is trying
District Attorney Kamala Harris is working with the schools to prevent truancy through intervention and school safety programs. She also has made it clear that she will prosecute those who flout the law.
going to stand up."
"I have yet to meet parents who clam up when people are sitting at the table with them offering help," said Susan Wong, the district's executive director of student services.
"We're not criminalizing the
kids," said Louise Renne, the district's general counsel. "Failing to act — that's criminalizing the kids."
A city grand jury last year found attendance laws have not been consistently enforced in 25 years, and that without change, the number of students receiving a diploma would drop markedly. The problem has been particularly troubling for black and Hispanic students, who have a disproportionately high truancy rate.
As administrator of a busy dropout-prevention office, Art Walker spent the better part of a day late last spring trying to get just one child, a boy named Francisco, back to school.
Making the plan work takes time—and persistence.
Walker went to the boy's temporary home, the back room of his grandmother's store, to confirm his living situation. Through a Spanish-speaking interpreter, Walker told the boy's mom about help available to her. He also said that her son must be in school or the district attorney would get involved.
involved. "Now," Walker said after leaving. "I think the message is clear."
winni two days, Francisco was back to school.
Newest Sprint phone offers multimedia clips
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
OVERLAND PARK — Channel surfing just moved from the couch to your cell phone.
Sprint will release its new PCS Vision multimedia phone tomorrow, which will allow subscribers to select channels of streaming video and audio for news, sports and entertainment.
With picture quality of 15 frames per second, the phone represents a big leap forward from Sprint's MobIT services, which were released last November.
The MM-A700 multimedia phone, produced by Samsung, will retail for $249.99 after a rebate.
month.
The service costs $9.99 per month for a "basic cable" option that includes content from NBC News, Fox Sports, The Weather Channel, a special Olympics news site and a comedy network.
Additional "premium" channels, including CNN, E! Entertainment and premium versions of Fox Sports and The Weather Channel can be purchased for between $3.95 and $4.95 per
The costs are in addition to the $15 monthly fee Sprint subscribers pay to access the Internet from their wireless phones.
The service uses video clips that approach television quality of 20 frames per second. MobiTV, which provides streaming network programming, operates at one or two frames per second.
Sprint officials said they were negotiating with additional content providers and would offer new channels later this year.
Once users have selected a channel, they can select from a list of clips that range from weather in a specific city to news reports on a specific issue. Many of the channels are produced
data," Kelly said. "This just becomes the next generation for consumers to experience that interaction."
exclusively for mobile phones, including larger type for the small screens.
Tim Kelly, senior vice president for marketing in consumer products at Sprint, declined to give subscriber numbers for MobiTV, but he said the numbers indicated consumers are interested in video programming and want better picture quality.
Linda Barrabe, a telecommunications analyst for The Yankee Group, said the market for video products on wireless phones was still new and that it was difficult to tell how much users would be willing to pay for such services.
"We've had a lot of success with consumers with wireless
But she said the high frame speeds and cable television sales model should help Sprint attract customers willing to invest in new technology.
Missouri university seeking new name
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Onnonents
COLUMBIA, Mo. — Despite concerns from Columbia lawmakers, gubernatorial candidates Claire McCaskill and Matt Blunt say they support charging the name of Southwest Missouri State University.
Opponents say there shouldn't be two statewide universities battling for limited resources,
The Springfield school wants to become Missouri State University, saying a new name would be more fitting because it's the state's second-largest university and draws students from all over Missouri.
and that Southwest Missouri State should join the University of Missouri system if it wants to be more than a regional school.
The name-change issue has failed in the Legislature in the past.
post:
Blunt, the Republican secretary of state, told the Columbia Tribune the change would reflect "what the institution already is." Blunt is from Springfield where lawmakers and Southwest Missouri State University officials support the new name.
McCaskill, the Democratic state auditor, earned a bachelor's degree in political science and a law degree from the University of Missouri-Columbia.
She told the newspaper she knows a lot of people "that went to school with me and care very much about the name, but it's just a name.
"I just don't think it's anything to get that excited about," she said.
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