Villaraigosa Underscores Importance of Attendance

In a show of his determination to have a hands-on role in school issues, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa addressed hundreds of high school truants and their parents Thursday night.

Villaraigosa, school Supt. Roy Romer and law enforcement officials implored about 250 Marshall High School students to improve their attendance, while warning parents that they could be prosecuted for their children’s absences.

“This is about taking responsibility. The parents need to look inside and say, ‘What am I doing to ensure that my kids are in school every day?’ ” Villaraigosa told the crowd, which included about 500 parents, gathered in the auditorium of the Franklin Hills campus. “If we as parents do not give our kids high expectations, why would we expect anyone else to?”

The mayor’s school appearance comes as part of his plan to make education a centerpiece of his administration and his intention to play a greater role in the autonomous Los Angeles Unified School District. In July, Villaraigosa backed away from plans to try to take control of the city’s ailing public school system, saying he would focus instead on more modest ways for city government to improve schools.

The mayor made reference to his intentions Thursday night, saying, “You’ve heard me say over the past few months that I’m going to be involved in this city’s schools.... I’m going to take responsibility for your children, too, because they are the future of this city.”

School district officials summoned the parents of the 1,300 Marshall students who missed 15 or more days of school last year, to inform them of their responsibility to get their children to school.

Some in the audience expressed surprise when Deputy Dist. Atty. Leslie Hanke announced that under state truancy laws, parents can be fined up to $2,500 or jailed up to a year if they are found responsible for their child’s consistent, unexcused absences. Families can also lose public assistance benefits if their children have more than nine unexcused absences within 60 school days.

“It was really good to come tonight because I didn’t know anything about the truancy laws and that I could get in trouble, or that my son could get in trouble,” said Sylvia Gomez, whose 15-year-old son Erick Calderon struggled with attendance last year. “I’m going to make sure he gets to school.”

Romer also told parents that if they want their children to be well-prepared to enter an increasingly competitive work environment, it is vital that they not miss school.

“This attendance issue is so important,” he said. “It’s like opening a gateway to a life that can be really rich.”

In California, a student is truant if he or she has more than three unexcused absences in a school year or is late 30 minutes or longer three or more times within a school year.

Figures on the number of truants in L.A. Unified were not available, but district officials said absenteeism continues to be a widespread and costly problem for the nation’s second-largest school system. Students who habitually miss classes, district officials said, often fall behind their peers in learning and are at higher risk of dropping out of school.

On average, more than 48,000 of the district’s 742,000 students do not attend school each day, according to district figures. Their absence takes more than an academic toll; school funding in the state is based largely on attendance rates. An absent student costs L.A. Unified about $27 each day.

After the meeting, Villaraigosa said truancy was one of the major issues being explored by the education advisory panel he has formed to address problems in the school district. He said the city and district needed to improve their ability to track truants and notify parents.