More than 10 un-excused absences

[Anonymous]

We attend our neighborhood DCPS, and recieved a letter that DD has more than un-excused absences and thus we need to come for a conference plus "the school is mandated to refer all students with 10 or more unexcused absences to the the child and family services and to the police." Our DD missed a few days of school due to illness, and we missed a week and a half of school around spring break due to a trip overseas. For the latter, we talked to DD's teacher and got work to take with us. Has anyone dealt with this? Will we be getting an investigation?

[Anonymous]

Illness is unexcused? What school is this....

[Anonymous]

I would email principal and ask for the policy that guides this and copy your school board member and Superintendent of your cluster (on DCPS website). What grade?

[Anonymous]

She is in first grade. Illness is apparently only excused if you send a note at the time, which we didn't know.

[Anonymous]

And the trip is not going to be excused

You will need to have the meeting with the school and they will likely ask you to provide some documentation for the days missed due to illness.

[Anonymous]

Chances are you will get a stern warning. Say you were ignorant re the note required after being sick and promise not to take time again for vacation outside of school breaks.

[Anonymous]

Here is the policy document. http://osse.dc.gov/page/student-attendance-and-support

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would email principal and ask for the policy that guides this and copy your school board member and Superintendent of your cluster (on DCPS website). What grade?

It's the truancy law in DC. It was changed before the 14-15 school year.

[Anonymous]

It is a policy that protects children, especially in light of the Relisha Rudd tragedy. In the future you need to write an excuse note when your child is absent. Every single time, otherwise DCPS is held accountable should something terrible happen.

[Anonymous]

It's hard to believe you are this uninformed in first grade. You also need to plan your vacation in the summer. This is very disruptive to the teacher and your child.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the advice here, the situation is just a bit frustrating as me brought DD overseas in part because it would be deeply educational, we ensured she kept up on her classes work, and in any case she is testing well above grade level so missing 10 days of formal school should not be a major concern of anyone. She is only six! Now I am worried that family services of something will start investigating us!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's hard to believe you are this uninformed in first grade. You also need to plan your vacation in the summer. This is very disruptive to the teacher and your child.

We moved here midway through last year and such a situation has never come up before. Both my husband and I had to travel to Ethiopia for work so we brought our children with us; was it a vacation option surely we would it have planned it at this time.

[Anonymous]

If your child was sick and you wrote a note, that is excused.

[Anonymous]

This is standard DCPS policy. A prior year our school admin folks messed up and failed to record a few absences due to illness correctly (we had documented them at the time), plus my child had missed a few days over the year due to travel. We didn't hit our 10 unexcused, but when we got to what they mistakenly documented as 9 unexcused absences, social workers began calling us non-stop. (That "9th unexcused absence" was actually because my child had a chance to meet President Obama and VP Biden, but DCPS counted that as an unexcused absence -- I must have received six or seven phone calls from social workers warning me that I would soon be referred to the police. I said but my child met the President and I have a photo to prove it, and they literally said that meeting the President wasn't considered excused and if it happened again they would open a police investigation -- FYI, my child was in kindergarten.)

Eventually I forwarded enough old emails showing that I had properly informed the school of illness at the time, that after a few more stern lectures they cleared us.

Good luck. It's quite a major drag, not to mention stressful.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous]Thanks for the advice here, the situation is just a bit frustrating as me brought DD overseas in part because it would be deeply educational, we ensured she kept up on her classes work, and in any case she is testing well above grade level so missing 10 days of formal school should not be a major concern of anyone. She is only six! Now I am worried that family services of something will start investigating us![/quote]

They could but it is unlikely. The policy is clear OP - even if there is parental approval (your educational trip)you can't miss more than 10 days unless it is for one of the specified reasons. My hunch is you will be able to write letters / get doctors notes for the days she was sick which will get you back under 10 total days.

Teachers cannot approve absences - it would have been helpful if she'd told you that but it isn't her job. This policy is in every student handbook I've seen in the city.