Truancy
Truancyis any intentional, unjustified, unauthorized, or illegal absence fromcompulsory education.It is a deliberate absence by a student's own free will and usually does not refer to legitimate excused absences, such as ones related to medical conditions. Truancy is usually explicitly defined in the school's handbook of policies and procedures. Attending school but not going to class is calledinternal truancy.Some children whose parents claim tohomeschoolhave also been found truant in the United States.[1][2]
In many countries, truancy is criminalized by law as either acriminalor acivil offense,and allows to prosecute truant students (under the age of 18), their parents, or both. Some countries, likeCanadaorAustralia,reserve fines for truant minors and permit to detain (but not arrest) them while skipping school. InRussia,Germanyand some parts of theU.S.police officers have power to even handcuff and arrest truant under-18s on streets during the school hours. Strict measures against truancy are usually motivated by compulsory education gaps among children and underage crime surge in big cities.[3]
Truancy is a frequent subject of popular culture.Ferris Bueller's Day Offis about the title character's (played byMatthew Broderick) day of truancy inChicagowith his girlfriend and best friend.Truancyis also the title of a 2008 novel about a student uprising against a dictatorial educational system. There are experiences that show that thanks to the incorporation of Successful Educational Actions (SEAs) in schools with high absenteeism they have managed to reduce truancy and thus contribute to the improvement of academic success.[4]
The term truant can also be used to describe a child that avoids duty, or is unruly, although this use is uncommon.[5]
History
[edit]In olderEnglish,atruantortruandwas any vagrant, vagabond, or shirker of duties.
The widespread legal obligation for towns and villages to provide free education did not evolve until the late-19th century and was born in such legislation as theEducation (Scotland) Act 1872.Over and above the obligation within such legislation for local government to provide school-buildings and -teachers, there was also a counterpart requirement for children to actually attend an educational institution, and thus the modern legal concept of school-oriented truancy was born.[6]
Most private schools had[when?]the concept of punishing pupils for non-attendance. This was done on a reverse principle[vague]:and schools had in principle to get the permission of parents to punish children.[7][need quotation to verify]
Slang expressions
[edit]There are a number of expressions in most languages which refer to truancy.
- Antigua and Barbuda:skudding.
- Argentina:ratearse.
- Bosnia and Herzegovina:escapingoreluding.
- France:drying (class) refers to truancy. "Faire l'école buissonière" or "l'école de la vie" is also used.
- Guyana:skulking.
- Ireland:dossing,mitching
- Italy:marinaremarinating (school)
- Jamaica:skulling.
- Mexico:pintearse.
- New ZealandandAustralia:wagging,jigging,ditching,bludging,orskipping school.
- NetherlandsandBelgium(Flanders)spijbelen,schoolziek.
- PakistanandIndia:bunking.
- Philippines:skippingorcutting class.
- Romania:a chiuli.
- SingaporeandMalaysia:pon, short for ponteng.
- South Africa:bunking,mulling,skippingorjippo
- Trinidad and Tobago:breaking biche.
- United Kingdom:bunking (off),skiving,wagging,kipping,mitching,twagging,oron the knock.
- Liverpool:cutting class,doggin,playing tickieorpuggin.
- Greater Manchester:legging.
- Wales:sagging,on the mitch.
- Scotland:on the hop,doggin it,beakingoron the beak,ticking it.
- United StatesandCanada:(playing) hooky,ditching,dipping,skipping,cutting (class).
- Newfoundland and Labrador:pipping off,on the pip.
- Utah:asluffcommonly refers to a truancy.
Punishments imposed
[edit]
Denmark
[edit]InDenmark,some welfare benefits[clarification needed]may be confiscated for a period if the child does not attend school. However, not all cities use this approach to keep the children in school.[8]Most cities[clarification needed]watch for families who have not returned their children to school after the summer vacation because some groupsexiledtheir children to their ethnic home countries forbehavior modification.In the city ofAarhus,155 children had not attended one week after school started.[9]In April 2009, research among 4,000 students showed that more than one in three had been absent during the past 14 days.[10]
Finland
[edit]InFinland,truant pupils are usually punished withdetentionin comprehensive schools. The police are not involved in truancy control, but teachers monitor the school and its surrounding area to avoid unauthorized absences. If a pupil is absent for a long period of time, the parents may be fined.[11]The child will not be escorted to school, but the government may remove the child from the household if truancy continues.
Germany
[edit]InGermany,truancy is prohibited until the age of 18, and parents can be fined up to 1,250 euros or jailed if their child misses too much school.[12]The students themselves can also be imprisoned for truancy from age 14 to 18, because the criminal responsibility age is 14 in Germany.[13]The students older than 18 cannot be held criminally liable for truancy.[12]The parents of a child absent from school without a legitimate excuse are notified by the school. If the parents refuse to send their child to school or are unable to control their child, local child services or social services officers may request the police to escort the child to school, and in extreme cases may petition a court to partially or completely remove child custody from the parents.[citation needed]
Israel
[edit]InIsrael,Attendance Officers (AO) are key figures helping students cope with difficulties of adjustment in school, which can cause them to drop out of the education system altogether. AOs are employed by the local authority, as authorized by theMinister of Education,and their role is to ensure that the Compulsory Education Law is implemented in educational institutions for all 15 years ofcompulsory schooling.In recent years, efforts have been made to professionalize and structure the role of attendance officer. A 2016 study of the AO role found there had been a change in the focus of the AOs' work – from concentrating on students who do not regularly attend an educational framework to intervention at an earlier stage with students who are still in a formal educational framework, but are experiencing adjustment difficulties. The data over the period from 2006 to 2016 indicated a decline in the relative percentage of students not in formal education (dropouts) out of all students in the care of AOs, and that most of those in the care of an AO did attend a formal framework. At the end of the period of AO intervention, 38% of the students who were not in an educational framework when the AO began work with them had returned to a formal framework. Among those who had been in a framework at the start of work but were contending with various difficulties, almost 90% were still in the framework at the end of the intervention. Finally, the data noted the multiple difficulties facing AOs working with theBedouinpopulation and with students in East Jerusalem, as well as the limited resources available to them.[14]
Italy
[edit]In Italy, compulsory education starts at six years of age and finishes at 16, but truancy constitutes a crime only for the elementary-school level.[citation needed]
Taiwan
[edit]Truancy is subject to an administrative fine, which may be continued until proper enrollment in the compulsory education.[15]
United Kingdom
[edit]InEngland and Wales,truancy is a criminal offense for parents if the child concerned is registered at school.[16]Truancy laws do not apply to children educated at home or otherwise under Section 7 of theEducation Act 1996.Since the passage of theCriminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000,parents of persistent truants may be imprisoned for up to three months.[17][18]In 2002, the first parent was imprisoned under this provision.[19][20]
Since 1998, a police officer of or above the rank of superintendent may direct that for a specified time in a specified area a police officer may remove a child believed to be absent from a school without authority to that school or to another designated place. However, this is neither a power of arrest nor a power to detain, and it does not make truancy a criminal offense.[21]A warning is issued to parents following the first instance of truancy, but for subsequent events, the parents are assessed a fine of at least £50. Some charities have highlighted an increasing prevalence of truancy among impoverished girls duringmenstruation,especially among girls who do not have easy access to sanitary products.[22]
United States
[edit] | This sectionneeds additional citations forverification.(August 2024) |
In theUnited States,truancy regulations are generally enforced by school officials under the context of parental responsibility. New automated calling systems allow the automated notification of parents when a child is not marked present in the computer, and truancy records for many states are available for inspection online.[citation needed]In large schools where law enforcement officers are present, the fine for truancy can range from $250 to as much as $500. About 12,000 students were ticketed for truancy in 2008 inLos Angeles.[23]Many states[clarification needed]provide for the appointment of local truancy officers who have the authority to arrest habitually truant youths and bring them to their parents or to the school that they are supposed to attend. Many states[clarification needed]also have the power to revoke a student's driver's license or permit. Where it exists, a school truancy officer is often concurrently aconstableorsheriff.
Children are required bylawto remain in school until the age of 16, although some states[citation needed]require schooling through age 18 unless an absence is formally excused by a school official or if the child has beenexpelled.In the 1972 case ofWisconsin v. Yoder,the Supreme Court determined thatAmishchildren could not be placed under compulsory education laws past the eighth grade.
Children inprivate schoolorhomeschoolingare exempt from attending mandatory public schooling.[24]
Truant's Day
[edit]InPolandand theFaroe Islands,the first day of spring (March 21) is an unofficial occasion popular among children, who traditionally are truant on that day.[25]In some American high schools, a "senior skip day" may be organized, often without the school's consent. The date for the skip day varies among different schools. In theEastern United States,skip day often occurs on the last Friday beforespring breakor on the Monday following the school'sprom.[26]
See also
[edit]- AWOL(absent without leave)
- School refusal
References
[edit]- ^"Home-school mom charged with allowing truancy".The Southern.25 April 2005.
- ^"Truancy & False Homeschooling".Coalition for Responsible Home Education.Retrieved2024-06-06.
- ^"Police use truancy sweep in battle against San Pedro burglaries".LAPPL – Los Angeles Police Protective League.2010-04-23.Retrieved2023-06-01.
- ^"Reducing absenteeism and early school leaving. [Social Impact]. INCLUD-ED. Strategies for inclusion and social cohesion from education in Europe (2006–2011). European Union's Sixth Framework Programme (FP6/2006–2012)".SIOR, Social Impact Open Repository.
- ^"Definition of TRUANT".
- ^Education (Scotland) Act 1872 etc
- ^Tom Brown's Schooldays
- ^Det virker at inddrage børnechecken(It works confiscating the child benefit check), by Anette Sørensen, Denmark's Radio, October 25, 2008
- ^155 elever er ikke mødt opArchived2009-01-07 at theWayback Machine(155 children have not started), by Majken Klintø, aarhus.dk, August 26, 2008
- ^"Børn pjækker mere fra skole",DR News, April 30, 2009
- ^"Äidille sakkoja lasten oppivelvollisuuden laiminlyömisestä – HS.fi – Kotimaa"(in Finnish). Archived fromthe originalon 23 September 2009.Retrieved1 February2011.
- ^abOLG Hamm, Beschluss vom 21. Dezember 2012, Az.: II-2 UF 181/11
- ^"Minimum Ages of Criminal Responsibility in Europe".archive.crin.org.Retrieved2023-09-15.
- ^Ruth Baruj-Kovarsky, Viacheslav Konstantinov, and Dalia Ben-Rabi.Attendance Officers in Israel – Analysis of Data from a Decade of Work with School Dropouts and Disengaged Students (Administrative Files 2005–2015).Jerusalem: Myers-JDC-Brookdale Institute (2018).
- ^Article 9of the Compulsory Education Act
- ^S.7 Education act 1996
- ^Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000,§72
- ^"Truancy timeline: 1997–2009".BBC News. 11 February 2009.
- ^"Jailing parents: What happened next?".BBC News. 12 February 2009.
- ^"Truancy mother sent to jail again".BBC Newsdate. 23 March 2004.
- ^"Electronic Records Online".Nationalarchives.gov.uk.Retrieved2012-01-21.
- ^Marsh, Sarah (2017-03-17)."Girls from poorer families in England struggle to afford sanitary protection".The Guardian.ISSN0261-3077.Retrieved2019-01-30.
- ^Ehrenreich, Barbara(8 August 2009)."Is It Now a Crime to Be Poor?".Opinion.The New York Times.p. 9.Retrieved1 February2011.
- ^"HSLDA: Homeschooling Advocates since 1983".Home School Legal Defense Association.Retrieved2019-11-06.
- ^"Public Holidays in Poland".Staypoland. Archived fromthe originalon 2012-06-11.Retrieved2012-01-21.
- ^Dyer, Elisabeth (14 April 2006)."Life's a beach for many students on senior skip day".St. Petersburg times.Retrieved23 November2010.
