Updated with ACPS response: School board alarmed by high number of students chronically absent at Hawthorne Middle/High School
Editor’s note: Superintendent Shane Andrew apologized on April 16 for the inaccurate data presented during this workshop.
BY JENNIFER CABRERA
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – During their lengthy workshop on April 10, the School Board of Alachua County heard a report on attendance trends in district schools. Board members were alarmed at the high reported rates of chronic absenteeism at Hawthorne Middle/High School, and staff members were unable to provide answers to questions about why that school’s absenteeism rates are so far out of line with the other schools in the district.
The full presentation can be reviewed here.
Goal: 95% attendance
The district’s goal is to have 95% attendance for SI (School Improvement) schools and each of the identified subgroups at the SI schools. However, the only elementary school reaching 95% is Hidden Oak, and Rawlings Elementary only averages 87.7% attendance.
The only subgroups reaching 95% attendance at SI schools are Asian students at Alachua, Idylwild, and Williams; white students at Williams; and English Language Learners at Williams.
None of the middle schools reach the 95% attendance goal; High Springs Community School is the highest at 93.74%, with Oak View close behind at 93.48%.
The subgroups in middle school who reach 95% attendance are Asian students at Bishop, Ft. Clarke, Kanapaha, Lincoln, Mebane, Oakview, and Westwood; white students at Lincoln; and English Language Learners at Lincoln.
None of the high schools reach the 95% attendance goal; PAM @ Loften is highest at 93.57%.
The subgroups in high school who reach 95% attendance are Asian students at Eastside, Buchholz, Gainesville, Newberry, and Loften; and English Language Learners at Eastside, Hawthorne, and Loften.
The overall average daily K-12 attendance numbers for this school year are similar to last year, but Edwards emphasized that when you’re comparing one year to another, you’re comparing different sets of students.
Chronic absenteeism
Edwards played a video about chronic absenteeism from the organization Attendance Works. The voiceover said, “This isn’t simply a matter of kids skipping school; it’s an issue of equity. Students living in poverty, students of color, and those with disabilities are much more likely to be chronically absent from school, face more attendance barriers, and often lack the resources to make up for lost time in the classroom… The good news is that chronic school absence is solvable… The key is forging partnerships and avoiding blame.”
Chronically absent students are those who have an attendance percentage lower than 90%; it counts both excused and unexcused absences.
The district’s goal is to have fewer than 10% of students chronically absent, and 12 elementary schools do not meet that goal: Archer, Parker, Chiles, and Wiles are over 10% but under 12%; Alachua and Idylwild are around 15%; Shell, Williams, and Terwilliger are in the 20s; and Lake Forest, Rawlings, and Metcalfe have over 32% of students chronically absent.
None of the middle schools meet the goal, but even so, Hawthorne is an outlier with 76% of 6th-8th graders chronically absent (see the chart at the top of this article). The rest are between 12% (Mebane) and 18% (Westwood).
None of the high schools except Loften (6%) meet the goal; Hawthorne is again an outlier with almost 62% of high school students chronically absent. The rest range from 13% (Buchholz) to 20.5% (Eastside).
The district has 1,624 students who are chronically absent in this school year.
District staff has no explanation for Hawthorne data
Member Tina Certain said the high chronic absenteeism in Hawthorne was “alarming” and asked what had been done to investigate the causes; Chief of Equity, Inclusion, and Community Engagement Anntwanique Edwards said she did “not know the answer right now.” She said the causes could be “transportation,… suspensions, it can be kids who are sick [or] skipping.”
Since all absences, including excused absences, count toward chronic absenteeism, Member Sarah Rockwell wondered whether the relatively large number of students on sports teams at a small school could affect those numbers. Edwards said that was “a good question.” Certain said she had looked at the district’s “Late bus” page, and “I didn’t see a lot of late buses for Hawthorne… We can eliminate that it’s not transportation-related.”
Edwards said it might be related to Hawthorne’s block schedule because students can complete their graduation requirements by the end of their junior year “and not show up in their fourth year because ‘I have 24 credits’ or ‘I only need to come to this one class.'” She added that there are also “quite a few” students with “behavioral concerns” at Hawthorne who “are missing a lot of time from school because of behavior.”
Family Liaison positions will sunset soon
The district has three employees who work on truancy, in addition to the Family Liaison positions, which are funded through ESSER, a source that will sunset soon.
Member Kay Abbitt asked how many truancy proceedings the district is pursuing with parents because “it seems like if we only have a few cases in the works right now and we have all these kids that are chronically truant, we need to put more personnel on that.”
Chair Diyonne McGraw agreed and asked for a meeting next week to “see what they are doing.”
Edwards said the Family Liaisons and attendance officers are “going out and knocking on doors” and providing backpacks with food for the kids, “making sure that we’re able to meet the mental health needs of families, being able to provide food – like all of these things that really aren’t even the primary role of a school district… And so, with a limited staff, we’re trying to make sure that we’re meeting the needs of the kids. in reality, our first and primary goals should really be the content areas of education, but we are getting kids who have all of these needs.”
Rockwell said the school-based teams need to look at why the students are absent and whether the absences are affecting their grades. She said that a football player, for example, might miss classes on game days but might be motivated to keep their grades up to stay on the team.
Truancy proceedings
Edwards said the Student Attendance Review Board starts a truancy proceeding if a student misses more than five days in a 30-day period; staff members can call the home, and Truancy Officers or School Resource Officers can visit the home. Educational Planning Teams from the district meet with the families to develop a plan, and there is now a virtual option for meetings; teams have held 40 meetings this year with families. Students with 15 or more unexcused absences in a period of 90 calendar days are legally truant.
Edwards said that in a recent survey of principals, 85% said that Family Liaisons are making a difference; 73% of them would like the Family Liaisons to continue to work over the summer (the position is ending at the end of the school year), but 97% said they have no funding source to pay the Family Liaison.
“Stay in the Game” attendance pep rallies
Edwards said that thanks to support from the Gainesville Chamber of Commerce Foundation, Metcalfe and Terwilliger elementary schools have joined the “Stay in the Game” attendance initiative. Monthly pep rallies reward the classes with the best attendance with prizes like pizza, Kona ice cream sandwiches, and Krispy Kreme donuts. Edwards said the program inspires children to come to school more often and on time. Terwilliger’s Principal said, “We have noticed students valuing attendance more since the pep rallies.”
ACPS Response
After this article was published, ACPS Public Information Officer Jackie Johnson sent the following information, which was not available at the workshop:
“First and foremost, a correction. In the chart presented at the workshop, the number of chronically absent students for both Hawthorne Middle and Hawthorne High was 159. That is (or was) correct for the entire school, but not for each of the middle and high school populations. In other words, chronically absent high school students were included in Hawthorne’s middle school count and vice versa. Not clarifying that was an error on our part.
“Also, it’s critical to note that the full count includes both active and inactive students. As of today, 140 TOTAL students at Hawthorne are listed as chronically absent. (Because it’s based on a percentage of school days missed, the chronically absent number changes daily). However, this includes 25 students who are no longer at Hawthorne Middle/High. At some point since August, they left the school and enrolled in another school, either in or out of the district or even in another state. That leaves 115 chronically absent students who are actually still students at Hawthorne Middle/High—44 in the middle school, 71 in the high school.
“But even that number doesn’t give a full picture of what’s really happening.
“For example, Hawthorne had a student who was enrolled at the beginning of the school year, attended for one week, then moved to another county. But because the student wasn’t enrolled by their family in a school there, the student still shows up on the list of Hawthorne’s active and chronically absent students. We can’t remove that student until they are enrolled in another school.
“Another example: There was a student who was formally enrolled, but it took a while for the family to make the transition so the student could actually start attending. That student is also counted as active and chronically absent.
“As you correctly pointed out in your article, the chronic absenteeism figure includes both excused and unexcused absences. Excused absences can be for illnesses (including chronic illnesses and students participating in the district’s Hospital/Homebound program), other absences authorized by the parents, and absences for extracurricular activities, such as sports and academic competitions.
“For example: Members of the girls’ state championship basketball team missed a day of school in March to play in the semifinals in Lakeland. The boy’s state championship football team missed two days of school in December to play in the state championship. Also, there are students in the school’s FFA program who have missed up to seven, eight, even ten days of school to compete in various agricultural competitions this year. That means that even if they have perfect attendance on all other days, they are still well on their way to being considered chronically absent.
“There are many other students at Hawthorne and at schools throughout the district who have similar stories behind their absences. But at a school like Hawthorne, with a total of just 466 middle and high school students, every one of those students and absences has an outsize influence on the attendance rates compared to a school like Buchholz, which has more than 2400 students just in grades 9-12.
“The school reviews all absences, including those of students listed as chronically absent. The school has put in place attendance incentives, including competitions that promote peer accountability. There is constant communication with students and families about the importance of regular attendance. The school’s outstanding family liaison, who has been at Hawthorne Middle/High for just over a year, spends much of her time talking with parents, visiting them at home and implementing other strategies. That may be something as simple as making it easier for parents to report their child’s absence as excused.
“As you noted, the issue of transportation did come up during the workshop. According to the Hawthorne family liaison, many absences during the first semester of this school year were related to bus issues. But she says that since the district revamped its transportation system in January, there are far fewer absences due to a lack of busing.
“As Dr. Edwards pointed out, absenteeism is a problem locally, statewide, and nationally, and there is always more work that needs to be done to make sure students are in school regularly. But it’s important for everyone to understand what the numbers really mean to be able to tackle the problem effectively.”
“This isn’t simply a matter of kids skipping school; it’s an issue of equity.” Sure it is, you keep telling yourself that. If the students at the schools have the same resources, why is one group chronically absent over another group? Better yet, why are there success stories from these same schools; the same demographic group?
“The good news is that chronic school absence is solvable… The key is forging partnerships and avoiding blame.” Maybe they should try to avoid deflecting the blame. It falls on the parents, many of these SBAC members and other community leaders expect kids to stop the gun violence but they can’t even get the kids to attend school. For once, Rockwell finally cleared the rocks; I’d wager if they took away the privilege of participating in athletics they would get better attendance. Stop the parents from attending the events as well.
The degradation of society continues.
Parents should receive warnings, face fines, and mandatory parenting classes (similar to traffic school classes for speeding tickets) to force them to address the problem. That is the easiest and most direct way to solve the problem.
The much more difficult solution requires an overhaul of our educational system and an acknowledgement that not all kids are the same and not all kids have the same potential. Everyone thinks their kids are the best but let’s be honest: some kids are naturally smart, most are average, and some are just never going to reach the same achievement and understand of math, reading, science, etc.
Instead of just throwing the never-achievers in with the rest, there should be career oriented programs run like trade schools, mechanical programs, etc. where someone can learn valuable skills that don’t require understanding calculus, chemistry, etc. One-size-fits-all doesn’t work when you are throwing kids with IQs of 120 and 90 together.
I don’t think any parents should be punished if their child does not meet the 95% attendance rate. That’s a statist position that most reasonable people would never want to grant to the government. As a commenter mentions below, this is about funding, not performance.
It’s about lack of attendance.
Yes and attendance is directly tied to funding….hint You have to get passed the straw man.
Please explain to me in very simple words how this is a ‘funding’ problem. Thank you in advance
It’s not about current funding, it’s about the future loss of funding. Future funding will be cut because students who are chronically absent don’t count as students anymore, hence the comment on funding.
Thank you. The comment above should then be ‘funding is tied to attendance’ not ‘attendance is tied to funding’. With that I agree.
Oops..Thanks for the correction. I was wondering what all the uproar was about regarding the funding/attendance comment. I see how that could be confusing as written.
Do you really think funding is the problem?
Lack of funding doesn’t keep the Asian kids from attending, their parents make sure they go to school.
It’s not about current funding, it’s about the future loss of funding. Future funding will be cut because students who are chronically absent don’t count as students anymore, hence the comment on funding.
“oh no! not a statist position!” We’d be so lucky to have a statist position available to us to fix this problem. Instead we are left with libertarian-friendly, don’t tread on me Republicants who think this is about ‘funding!’. Ha! No amount of funding will overcome what is primarily a biological problem, and only secondarily a cultural problem.
I mostly agree, although you are (perhaps intentionally) conflating many of the problems.
Parents should NOT receive warnings. Not because this is a ‘statist position’ as some other commenter stated, but because we don’t WANT these kids attending class. The type of student to be chronically absent is exactly the type to drag down the rest of the class.
While every sane person agrees we need an overhaul of the educational system, I disagree that ‘everyone thinks their kids are the best’. Most of the parents of these truancy cases don’t give a rats rear-end about their kids. Let’s not assign beneficent motives to trash parents. And while it defies mathematical definitions, most kids are not ‘average’ by any historical standard; they are far below average.
Instead of ‘throwing the never-achievers in with the rest’, we should likewise not throw them into trade schools. We should let them commit their inevitable crime and then put them in jail for the rest of their lives.
IQs of 120 with IQs of 90 is being generous. Most of these truancy cases are lucky to scrape room temp IQs and their impulse control is similarly stunted. Heaven help us.
Now days, you gotta use your head for most any job, and the skill level in the trades is getting higher. I think the answer is work ethic; work hard, do your very best, and doors will open. (My grandmother taught school her whole working life; and that was her advice to me.)
This has to do with funding. School board wouldn’t care if a student missed two days of classes per month otherwise. I’d venture to say that most children shouldn’t be in these schools as often as they are actually.
In states like Florida schools lose funding when daily average attendance drops…known as per pupil funding.
“According to DOE data, the average per-pupil spending in the United States was $13,187 in 2020. For a school of 500 students, just a 2% absenteeism rate would lead to a loss of $131,870 annually.”
https://expertbeacon.com/do-schools-lose-money-when-students-are-absent/
Feds also push attendance over actual education. Just because a student is present doesn’t mean they’re being properly educated..it just means more funding
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/01/17/fact-sheet-biden-harris-administration-announces-improving-student-achievement-agenda-in-2024/
Well, I agree that it’s not about current funding, but it’s most definitely about the future loss of funding. Future funding will be cut because students who are chronically absent don’t count as students anymore, hence the comment on funding.
Per state law, kids must be in school.
Perhaps its time to codify attendance requirements and punishments for not meeting them.
I go to the gym daily. I want to understand why MANY kids are playing pick up basketball in the middle of a school day…and don’t tell me it’s homeschooling recess.
GPD should go pick them up and deliver to school.
“Florida law defines “habitual truant” as a student who has 15 or more unexcused absences within 90 calendar days with or without the knowledge or consent of the student’s parent or guardian, and who is subject to compulsory school attendance.“
https://www.fldoe.org/how-do-i/attendance-enrollment.stml
I think you may be conflating truancy laws with the school board’s attendance goals. Truancy is strictly defined. The school board’s attendance goals have nothing to do with truancy. The attendance goal is set at 95% because at that point and above the school will not lose out on per pupil funds.
Fla’s truancy laws are fairly understandable and acceptable as written but the school boards push for 95%+ attendance (whether excused or unexcused, whether A+ or F student, etc etc) is pretty ridiculous and is solely a fiduciary issue.
My first thoughts as I read the article. Funny how The Asian kids always score higher while being the least represented. The ‘equity and blah blah blah’ director needs to go if she can’t or won’t address the problem. Parents of truant kids should be held accountable.
Why TF does EVERYTHING have to be about race? It’s ignorant to continue to use that as an excuse for everything. I get it. Race is an issue on a lot of topics. But to say students of color not making it to school is about equality is the stupidest thing I’ve heard from SBAC in a long time. And that is saying something. White, black, brown or purple, this lady is an idiot. While she is talking nonsense, we’ve still yet to hear anything from the sbac about the pedos at Santa Fe High. Maybe they should get some priorities straight.
B/c government can’t solve the real issue which is fatherless households would be my guess.
Let me amend a bit. Rolling back some of LBJs great society programs at federal level may help some imo. Chances of that are 0.00% though so here we are. I’m not a libertarian but interesting read
https://libertarianinstitute.org/economics/lbj-great-society-war-on-poverty-welfare-state-helped-ruin-black-communities/
Kids having kids…. Lack of a father figure, and lack of religion.
I hypothesize that kids with the highest rates of absenteeism fall into the above category. Regardless of race.
They may have siblings who went thru college and ended up unemployed but still with student loan debt. It may have been better to wait til later to go to college, after working and saving, building credit and decide if family is more important than school. Add in transportation and moving costs, they think “why try?” So why go to school in the first place?
It takes commitment and planning, but also a support system at home. Many don’t have either.
The chronically absent kids aren’t ‘building up credit’ for college nor are they planning to go.
You are THIS close to getting it. It is, in fact, about race; just not the way in which they are presenting it.
It’s crazy that the only time you hear about Hawthorne from the SBAC is when it’s negative. This is the school that has an outstanding agriculture program and amazing football and basketball programs and you barely hear anything about that. Instead do you hear how close Buchholz came to winning. But still lost. Hawthorne never gets credit. I truly believe that the SBAC wishes that school would’ve closed down. As far as they are concerned, SBAC schools stop at Eastside. They forget there’s multiple schools past Eastside. if you want people to go to school, how about dumping some money into the facilities out there.
Yep, just like they closed Waldo, basically disenfranchising every student in that area.
One group is not demonstrating chronic absence but the other is based off of equality. That this group does not have resources to make up for missed school work, they face attendance barriers. Forming partnerships and avoiding blame. All the chief of equality is doing is singling out a group of students and saying it’s not their fault for missing school, being suspended, etc. Missing school is the reason kids are getting poor grades. All they want to do is excuse disciplinary problems for kids who do not want to learn, do not care about themselves. They seemingly want to fund three positions that will sunset, hum raise them school taxes again. Williams and the rest of these equality udiots are nothing more then racists. Blaming demographics and singling out a group of students. This is why black Americans are fleeing the Demoncrat party. This pandering doesn’t work. Hold parents accountable as well as students for their actions. As as a parent of a bi-racial family I am disgusted that people blame race as a reason for not getting ahead in this world. Proper parenting, education, morals, and hard work get you ahead.
Pizza, Krispy Kreme donuts, and ice cream sandwiches? Don’t they know about the childhood obesity and diabetes epidemic?
It begins and ends with parenting
Maybe the fact that the public education system (k-16, at least) has become a total indoctrination joke has something to do with it?
Exactly!…what’s the big deal if you don’t want to send you children to indoctrination camp every damn day? It’s not like they’re going to become successful businessmen or great thinkers if they hit the magical 95% attendance rate in your local government school…and they damn sure aren’t being taught morals and ethics there! Public schools (and most private) are extremely overrated and are mainly in place as a daycare system that has morphed into a giant bureaucracy full of angry union employees.
How this article’s comments turned into bashing blacks and/or fatherless kids is beyond me (not really)…it’s very obviously a funding-related SBAC issue…..they ain’t gonna lose those funds without a fight!
But so long as you keep the public fighting against each other they’re unable to see the true problem at hand
I think theres 2 divergent issues going on in this thread at once. The first is why do the schools want the students to attend (its the $). The second is what is the cause of the students not attending, regardless of the schools motivation for them to be there (lack of 2 parent households (stability) is my thought on why, a problem the feds helped create imo). Haven’t seen any black bashing yet but maybe i’ve missed that part of it, dunno
I don’t think absences are because public school have become a ‘total indoctrination joke’. The parents of these kids are not sitting at home saying ‘Timmy, you don’t need to go to school today because those silly woke moralist scolds are going to indoctrinate you!’. These parents simply don’t care about their kids and these kids are too short sighted (or altogether incapable) to care about themselves.
So, this isn’t rocket science. The schools with the lowest attendance rates are the schools with the lowest student achievement. Does bribing them to come to school with ice cream and pizza parties really work? For elementary kids not coming to school, who else is to blame except the parents? The kids can’t drive themselves!
Some people’s “religion” seems to be thinking that you are entitled to everything without ever needing to accept responsibility for anything.
First commandment: “Ain’t no one tell me what to do or I can’t have something!”
Shame Shame Shame.
The situation in Hawthorne is a disgrace. And when one takes student counts for the magnet programs out of the Eastside high population, the situation there stinks, too.
As an Alachua County taxpayer, I am truly ashamed because education is the one thing proven to get people out of poverty and those kids are being systematically robbed of their future.
Ms. McNealy represents those schools and has been on the SBAC since 2012. She should have resigned at the end of the presentation. Ms. Certain has been on the board plenty long enough to be able to list the root causes of these problems by now. She should be gone, too.
Jennifer, thanks for updating this with the district’s response.
I stand by my prior comment.
The corrected 140 number reflects 30% chronic absentees even after the bus problems have been worked out. And all the stuff about kids coming and going should be ignored unless the other schools take those kids out of their numbers.
Certain said the high chronic absenteeism in Hawthorne was “alarming” and asked what had been done to investigate the causes.
What’s truly alarming is that Chief of Equity, Inclusion, and Community Engagement Anntwanique Edwards said she did “not know the answer right now.” But she chose to play a video that, as her job title goes, states it’s likely a problem with equity. PUNT!
The old saying goes, “You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.” From the statistics, there’s some that can’t be lead to water no matter what’s being offered either.
The real answer is not politically acceptable, plus it would eliminate the need for the DEI positions.
Do absences count as school F grades on the state ratings of schools? If so, that’s very bad.
The east county still has lots of potential, with its beautiful lakes and trees, conservation easements and huge Weyerhaeuser residential-commercial zoned area ready for development.
I’d bet on the east county before the west, unless you like traffic, sinkholes and water depletion in the western county?
My kids go to Hawthorne middle highschool. The school is not safe filled with drugs and the only answer is prison ruining the lives of our young people before they can even become an adult. Teachers are not even doing their jobs. Hawthorne middle highschool this is the last year my kids will attend. I will be finding a new school.
Where’s “21 Jump Street” when you need them?
Not the comedy movie, the original.
It is imperative to revolutionize the educational culture in Hawthorne. Initially, the School System Brain Trust shall allocate substantial funds to enhance personal and leadership capacities within the system. A significant financial incentive should be offered to the exceptionally skilled and talented teachers, motivating them to commit to a minimum three-year tenure in Hawthorne. The same incentive should be extended to the school’s leadership, including the Principal and Assistant Principal. Additionally, the allocation of resources towards hiring extra truancy officers is crucial to address this persistent issue. Although this may not be a novel concern in Hawthorne, it is imperative that it becomes a top priority for resolution. Several other potential solutions may arise, and it is crucial to attentively heed and promptly act upon them.
When I read ‘hire extra truancy officers’ I can’t help but hear:
“Bus your kids to our schools everyday or we’ll have the police arrest you. We aren’t going to lose the state and federal funding streams that our gods assigned to that little creature of yours.”
Kick the bad apples out, yes. Weaponize the school system against parents, nope. Protect children from abusive parents, yes. Arrest a parent if kid misses one day a week…that’s crazy and none of anyone’s business.
Next thing we know the police will be called because you don’t bring your kids to a $200 ‘wellness visit’ every two months at your pharma addicted pediatrician’s office…hello socialized healthcare. Hello socialized education.
Budget must grow. Next thing we know they’ll be promoting year-round schooling. Oh wait…
yup..exactly my guy.😊
This response doesn’t explain why none of this information was available when board members asked questions at the workshop. Just more evidence of incompetence at ACPS.
“…. Avoid blaming blame.”
No, that’s not going to happen. We have a dysfunctional school board that like a virus has spread to leadership/administration.
Equity has nothing to do with this. It’s single mothers who don’t have Father’s around to take a belt out to fix the problem.
**“…. Avoid placing blame.”
Good spin by the Johnson formerly known as Kurtz.
Instead of guessing what the cause of the attendance problems are, why not go to the source? Adults, its clear that you guys have no middle ground to meet on, so ASK the children what the problem is. Of course we know that for the very young we have to look at the parents or caregivers, but for the older students, what’s really going on. If it’s that they want to learn new a fresh material, or, are tired of test, or just don’t want to come anymore you will have something to start with. After you receive your answers, adults get to work. This sounds like a bunch of children fussing on the playground and not responsible leaders. REALLY?
Utilizing the resources of UF’s College of Education (and even Santa Fe) – why can’t the State come in and as a turnaround project – take over the entire school district for a couple of years??
Tear it all down and rebuild the district from Hawthorne to Newberry – brick by brick.
‘Attendance barriers’. lmao.
“Public education” is perhaps America’s greatest piety. All men are not created equal when it comes to learning calculus, writing basic sentences (much less poetry), or even sitting in their chairs for 15 minutes without interruption.
Exactly. The world needs ditch-diggers.
More excuses equal more questions without any answers.
“Also, it’s critical to note that the full count includes both active and inactive students…
However, this includes 25 students who are no longer at Hawthorne Middle/High. At some point since August, they left the school and enrolled in another school, either in or out of the district or even in another state.”
That sounds somewhat familiar, but in another context.
Something tells me this won’t be a problem at the new Frazer school. So, what is the difference? Hmmmmm…..
I agree that parents are responsible for their children.
However, gov’t has intimidated some parents into appeasing their children rather than disciplining them. I don’t advocate abusive discipline. But I do advocate discipline – not just taking away an electronic device or something like that.
It’s a real problem that parents are both expected to control their children and also taught that any consequences that might be physical in nature are inappropriate. Kids who know and respect the boundaries are (for the most part) happier kids who can operate successfully in society.
It’s such a pathetic joke that our tax dollars go to overpay for a Chief of Equity. How about a Chief of Discipline? Kids might go to school if it wasn’t like going to a dangerous ghetto with no law and order.
people don’t come to school because the teachers DO NOT TEACH, they just throw them on a laptop.
but it does not explain why students is late
School funding is booty
Its not about school funding, its about checking whats happening to the kids that makes them late, is it the parents, the busses. who knows. come on step it up
these students need to turn on X-GAMES mode.
FactNoPostalPrinter
not true Hawthorne is amazing school