School marked my kid absent when she was in class—WWYD?

[Anonymous]

DD14 was marked absent for 3rd period yesterday, despite being present for 1st, 2nd, 4th, lunch, 5th, and 6th, and despite having the paper assignment that was handed out during 3rd period.

She spoke with the teacher today; he said attendance has already been submitted and only an administrator can change it. I contacted the AP, who said essentially the same thing, that attendance is submitted to the main office and can’t be changed, adding that there’s “no way to prove” she was actually in class and not somewhere else in the building, or how she obtained the assignment, without escalating it to the main office for investigation. Everyone seems content to pass the buck.

DD has no other absences this year, so I’m not worried about truancy, but this is currently an unexcused absence, which I don’t love having on her record when she was actually in class. I was told I could simply log into the portal and mark it excused (e.g., sick), but that feels like conceding something that isn’t true, and if I do that, I lose any standing to push back later if needed.

WWYD: push this with the main office to have the record corrected, or just mark it excused and move on?

[Anonymous]

Did the teacher admit she was there?

[Anonymous]

So the teacher doesn’t know if your child was in class ?

Who’s lying? Your child or that teacher ?

[Anonymous]

Who cares? It's ONE period.

[Anonymous]

Who cares? This is such a nothingburger.

[Anonymous]

It's normal, then they complain about absences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who cares? This is such a nothingburger.

It is a nothingburger which is why it is so odd that they didn't just admit their mistake and apologize.

[Anonymous]

I would never mark that day as excused when she was there in the first place. You've gone so far, I advise you to persist and get an administrator to change it. Just to make your point and annoy the heck out of them.

Separately, my kids are/were in MCPS and I've given up on correcting absences. They were times when they were marked present yet they were absent and at medical appointments, and times were they were marked absent and actually in class, with the assignments and class notes to prove it. Usually it's due to substitute teachers making attendance errors. In MCPS, attendance doesn't really matter, so I just turn a blind eye to mistakes.

[Anonymous]

This exact thing happens to each of my kids around once per year. Maybe twice. Often it is because they marked the wrong kid absent by accident or didn’t see a kid present in class at first. It is pretty easy to see lots of ways this would happen IMO.

I have them talk to the teacher- sometimes the teacher is able to correct it, other times not. I don’t make a fuss about it. Thus far, it has never mattered for any reason.

I’d probably just excuse the absence yourself and be done with it, if you want. I’ve never bothered. It is just a honest teacher mistake and (IME) there aren’t really consequences for your child.

[Anonymous]

If my kid has an attendance mistake I ask them to put in reasonable effort to fix it, like mentioning it to the teacher. I do nothing beyond that. At least in our school (MCPS) one off absences don’t really seem to matter.

[Anonymous]

I would not call about this- at all. Who cares? She was there, turned in her work, no one has called you about the pseudo-absence.

[Anonymous]

I would email the teacher and the main office. That's lame they act like it can't be fixed when it's their mistake.

[Anonymous]

Unless someone is going to not let her turn in an assignment because she has an unexcused absence, spend no more brainpower on it. This happens to my kid from time to time and I ask him what happened and it’s almost always “there was a sub and I didn’t hear my name” or “I got back late from the bathroom”. I don’t bother to call the school, and no one has bothered to call me.

[Anonymous]

We realized MCPS does not care at all. My kids report cards would have lots of random absences. At first I followed up but then realized it was a waste off time. Unless there is an issue that affects the grades just ignore.

[Anonymous]

This has happened in FCPS more times than I can count. It’s really no big deal. I’m a teacher too and sometimes it happens when I have a sub and they mark a kid absent by accident. Occasionally one comes in late and I forget to cha ge attendance. Once or twice I’ve marked the wrong kid absent.

Attendance can fix it after I verify I screwed up. I apologize and we all move on.

As a parent, I ask my kid if they skipped and if it was a mistake, I email attendance politely it’s always been fixed. And if it wasn’t I wouldn’t care. One unexcused absence won’t matter.