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Schools Warn Students About Holiday Exodus : Education: Administrators tell parents that traditional trips to see relatives in Mexico and other Latin American countries might interfere with studies and jeopardize graduations.

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

With the approach of Christmas, the attendance rate at some Ventura County schools traditionally drops as students with family in Mexico and other Latin countries start vacation early to visit relatives for the holidays.

But at the 2,100-student Hueneme High School in Oxnard, where three years ago as many as 150 students left for Christmas and some stayed away for a month or more, counselors use aggressive techniques to reverse the trend.

At the beginning of the school year, counselors hold a meeting for parents of students in the English as a Second Language program, warning that the traditional sojourn might delay their children’s studies and jeopardize their high school graduations, said counselor Gilbert Cuevas.

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Some families want to leave early to be in Mexico by Dec. 12, in time for a national celebration in honor of the country’s patron saint, Our Lady of Guadalupe. Others return for weddings and fiestas traditionally held in December. Persuading them to change their plans is often a matter of explaining the academic calendar and attendance requirements, counselors said.

Parents also receive flyers written in Spanish that repeat the warning. And if parents still want to pull a child out, the family must attend a counseling session with Cuevas, who pleads that they reconsider.

“If a student tells one of the counselors, ‘I’m going to Mexico,’ they say, ‘You can’t go until your parents see Mr. Cuevas,’ ” Cuevas said. “At least that gives me a crack at them.”

About 25 students had left by last week, Cuevas said.

Hueneme is not alone in facing the problem, Cuevas said. “The same problem exists all the way from Northern California to San Diego,” he said.

In the Oxnard Union High School District, requests come mostly from Latino students, Cuevas said. “It does happen with other students in our district, but less frequently,” he said.

At Hueneme High, a new school calendar with four terms a year rather than two semesters is also expected to help students who take the long breaks, Principal Terry Taylor said.

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Although the calendar was changed primarily for educational reasons, including giving students more electives and longer class periods, it also benefits students who take extended vacations. Even if they miss a term, they can still earn enough credits in the remaining three terms to be promoted to the next grade.

Previously, “a kid who did not complete the work essentially blew the entire semester,” Cuevas said. However, Hueneme counselors urge students to take only the scheduled vacation or to wait until summer to visit out-of-country relatives.

“We tell them that an absence of two weeks from a quarter system would mean assuredly that the student would fail that quarter,” Cuevas said.

In many cases the counseling works, Cuevas said.

The family of Hueneme High senior Ana Alarcon, 17, changed plans after a session with Cuevas. The Alarcons of Oxnard were planning to leave Nov. 28 to visit relatives in Mexico. The trip would have lasted nearly six weeks.

But the time off would have caused Ana to fail a computer course that she considers key to her career after high school. No more than three absences are permitted.

“I didn’t want to go,” Ana said. “I came and told Mr. Cuevas that I had no choice.”

But after Cuevas and Ana urged her parents not to take her on the trip, the Alarcons decided to postpone it.

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Ofelia Alarcon, whose comments were translated from Spanish by daughter Ana, said the family decided that Ana’s education was more important than the trip.

Hueneme senior Lucy Alcantar, 17, left Friday with her family for Michoacan in southern Mexico for her sister’s Dec. 15 wedding. Lucy, a straight-A student, said teachers gave her assignments to take with her. She will return about Dec. 29.

After meeting with Hueneme counselors, however, Lucy’s father decided that her brother Sixto, 14, will remain behind with an uncle because his grades are not as high and he cannot afford the time out of the classroom.

Some school officials credit counselors with helping to change parents’ attitudes. Changes in school calendars also may make a difference if they allow more leeway or give students more time off at Christmas.

For example, officials in the Fillmore Unified School District are hoping that their transition to a year-round calendar will reduce the number of students taking extended journeys during the holiday break, Supt. Marlene Davis said. The new calendar gives students three weeks instead of two for the holiday break.

“We’re hoping that our parents who are taking kids to Mexico will find three weeks sufficient, so that they don’t either take their kids out early or bring them back late,” Davis said.

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But countywide, the problem is still prevalent. Long absences are a bigger issue at high schools than at elementary schools because older students are trying to accumulate credits toward graduation, officials said.

At Oxnard’s Channel Islands High last week, 54 students out of 2,675 had requested additional time off, attendance clerk Charlotte Ortiz said.

On forms that must be signed by a parent, a dean and a counselor, many students indicated that they would be away from Dec. 3 until mid-January, Ortiz said. Channel Islands’ regular two-week vacation is from Dec. 24 to Jan. 7.

To help migrant and other students continue to earn credits if they are away, many Ventura County schools participate in a nationwide program called PASS, or Portable Assisted Study Sequence. Essentially a correspondence course, PASS allows migrant students to make up credits through independent study under a teacher’s tutelage.

Courses taken and credits earned through PASS are stored in a national computer bank so that the records are easily available if the student moves to another area.

At some schools, teachers put together packets of homework assignments for students to take with them.

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In Fillmore, however, officials discontinued a similar independent study program, Davis said.

“When a student is in independent study, the law says they’re supposed to be working four to six hours a day on schoolwork” under a parent’s supervision, Davis said. “How many parents go on vacation and do that?”

Moreover, some parents of migrant students take children out of school to work, counselors said.

Instead of offering independent study, Fillmore changed its attendance policy, instituting a program called “planned absence.” Under district policy, students who miss more than 15 days risk failure. However, students are allowed five days of planned absence with written permission from the parents.

However, if a student extends a planned absence beyond five days, the additional days are deducted from the 15 days of allowed absence, Davis said.

Manuela Ryce, migrant program counselor at 850-student Fillmore High, said she asks every student who requests a leave to bring both parents in for a review of the district’s attendance policy. They also review teacher forms that indicate whether a student would risk failing a class if he spends time away from school.

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At Hueneme High and other schools in the Oxnard Union High School District, there is no board policy on a minimum number of days that can be missed, district officials said, although some teachers set a minimum number of days that can be missed before a student risks failing.

Cuevas said the lack of a policy in the Oxnard district is a problem. Until there is a policy, he said, “I think students are going to stretch it to the limit.”

But Assistant Supt. Gary Davis said the district has studied the idea and decided against it.

“We don’t believe that would curtail it,” he said. “Certain families have certain patterns and lifestyles and calendars, and they do that even to the detriment of their children. We feel that’s unfortunate, but the answer doesn’t lie in implementing a school policy.”

Nevertheless, Cuevas said he is encouraged because, after counseling, many parents rearrange travel plans and don’t take their children out of school beyond the allotted Christmas vacation.

Others, however, find the pull of tradition and family ties too strong.

“More than anything else,” Cuevas said, “I’d like to send a message loud and clear, especially to Latino parents who may want to go on a trip to Mexico, that that’s not acceptable. It really hurts the education of the children.”

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