Truants Now Telling It to the D.A.

It’s 11:13 a.m., and Deputy Dist. Atty. Pam Grossman is fed up.

This is the second time she has been stood up by an Oxnard woman who has yet to explain why her 6-year-old has missed 35 days of kindergarten this year.

No more excuses. Grossman instructs an Oxnard police officer to cite the woman and asks the state welfare department to investigate whether she should really be receiving benefits.

“I think that if she’s not taking care of her kids, or raising them, she should not be receiving aid for them,” says the prosecutor.

Grossman is the “teeth” behind Ventura County’s Truancy Referral and Prosecution Program, a get-tough approach to getting kids in school. Her presence is credited by school officials for boosting attendance and getting families the help they need to curb the ditching problem.

No attendance figures are available to gauge the program’s success. But since it began eight months ago, the program has won a statewide award for its effectiveness and creativity. Parents are making a more concerted effort to get their kids to school, even if it means dragging them there in their pajamas.

And attendance of some of the most obstinate truants has shot up.

Grossman’s success is attributed to the way she interacts with families. A divorced mother of three and grandmother to six, Grossman understands many of the challenges families face. She hears their stories, sympathizes with them, and works with them to fix whatever is causing the truancy. But she’s no pushover. If they refuse to cooperate, Grossman cracks down.

“It’s toughness with a gentleness,” said Wayne Saddler, assistant principal at Rio del Valle Junior High School in Oxnard. “She is very firm with the families, very serious, willing to work with the family if they are willing to work with her. And that comes off at the meetings.”

At a recent truancy hearing, Grossman heard 11 cases out of Oxnard Elementary School District. They included those of a 13-year-old boy who said he can’t wake up in time for class, an 11-year-old girl who says the boys at school tease her and a 10-year-old who can’t seem to pull herself away from TV in the morning.

Those who showed up looked nervous. They shuffled their feet, picked at the table and fiddled with tissues. By the end of the day, several adults promised to attend parenting classes and their children swore to go to bed earlier. A few hard-core cases, including the mother of that kindergartner, were referred to court.

Some parents resent being told how to raise their children, while others are grateful for help getting their child to school. Others just need a little guidance dealing with their kids.

The truancy program began last March to crack down on parents and students who weren’t taking the school districts seriously. For years, students skipped class knowing they could get away with it. That’s because the local Student Attendance Review Boards, or SARBs, were made up almost entirely of school administrators who could do little more than lecture students and parents about the law and the importance of going to school.

Then the SARBs got tough. They lobbied the county and got the district attorney’s office, local police, probation officers and various social-service agencies involved. Also involved is CalWorks, the state welfare agency, which can cut parents’ benefits if their children do not regularly attend school.

Grossman jumped at the chance to tackle the problem. She grew up in a household where education was not a priority. She also is one of the few people in her extended family to have earned a college degree. She says she just wants to give students the tools they need to succeed.

“I can see how difficult it is in life to not have a degree or have that advantage to further your career,” said Grossman, 49. “I’m hoping to make a difference in some kids’ lives and make them understand and appreciate the value of an education.”

Grossman started her career as a receptionist in a law firm. She worked her way up and went to law school, earning her degree seven years ago. She joined the district attorney’s office, entered the child-abduction unit and later the juvenile delinquency unit.

She now attends all the SARB hearings among the county’s 14 school districts. She and the others on the board hear about 150 cases a month. They review each one, try to learn the cause of the truancy, and then work with the families to correct the problem.

Those who get their attendance levels up by the next SARB hearing are given breaks. Those who balk at the system suffer the consequences.

Since March, Grossman has sent 30 students and 10 parents to court, where they were fined or sentenced to community service. Some parents had to pay $275. Others were sent to parenting classes and ordered to volunteer at their child’s school. Students also were sentenced to community service. They picked up garbage, painted over graffiti or cleaned local parks. Five students had their driver’s licenses suspended for a year.

Studies have shown that habitual truants are more likely to drop out than their school-going counterparts. According to U.S. Department of Justice statistics, 46% of jail inmates nationwide lack a high school diploma or its equivalent.

Truants are also more likely to join gangs, use drugs and alcohol, and commit violent crimes. In 1997, the California Youth Authority found that 76% of the juveniles processed through the system were ditching school at the time of their arrest. Of those juveniles, most had stopped regularly attending classes by sixth grade.

There are a number of reasons why kids play hooky, from laziness and rebellion to serious problems with emotional or psychological issues such as depression and separation anxiety.

For that reason, “each case needs to be evaluated on its own,” said Tom Hicklin, a physician and assistant professor of psychology at USC’s School of Medicine. “If you try to give them the same treatment, it’s wrong. The treatment might be coercive when they might really be having serious emotional problems.”

Some problems are easy to fix, as with the 13-year-old Oxnard boy who stopped going to school after a growth spurt rendered his pants too short. He was afraid his fellow classmates would tease him. Grossman bought him new pants.

Other cases are more complicated. A 13-year-old boy had been abandoned by his father, then his mother, and is now being raised by his stepfather, a long-distance truck driver. The teen missed 35 days of school last year and is truant again.

At the hearing in Oxnard, officials expressed sympathy for the youngster. Instead of sending him to court, where he would probably be sent to a detention facility, they decided to talk to the judge to explore other alternatives, perhaps placing him in foster care.

“I feel so different about this child,” said Donna Burger, a parent volunteer who serves on the board. “To me, this child is crying out for attention.”

Grossman is not always as sympathetic. An eighth-grader who showed up at the hearing, but whose parents didn’t, is on the brink of going to court. He has skipped 12 days of school, is failing three classes and couldn’t read an informational pamphlet that Grossman placed in front of him. He had been to these hearings before, and his excuse this time was an inability to wake up for class.

Grossman made arrangements to get him an alarm clock, but her patience was wearing thin.

“You’re a big boy,” she told him. “We’ve been down this issue about getting up in the morning. It’s baffling there isn’t a clock in your house.”

Sometimes all it takes is a little guidance. Another parent explained she has a hard time getting her daughter out of the house before the first bell. The 10-year-old has missed five days of school and has been tardy 11 times. This was her first truancy hearing.

Grossman offered some suggestions: Put your daughter to bed at 8:30 p.m., keep the television turned off in the morning and make sure her books and homework are packed the night before. The mother agreed and suddenly looked worried when she discovered she could be sent to court if her daughter doesn’t shape up.

As the woman stood to leave, Grossman made an offhand remark about seeing her later. The woman chuckled nervously.

“I hope not,” she says.