We examined the effect on attendance of a truancy court-diversion program for elementary students. Truancy court-diversion programs represent a shift from a law-and-order approach toward a public health model to address school absenteeism. Instead of directly referring parents of truant elementary students to child protection services or juvenile…

Educators are under increasing pressure to improve the climate and safety in urban schools. Unfortunately, schools have addressed school safety concerns by increasing exclusionary measures such as suspensions and expulsions. Knowing that exclusionary measures can have detrimental effects, state legislatures have called for more proactive…

Truancy has been identified as a risk factor of criminal behavior but results are mixed as to the best means to reduce this school-based concern. The Truancy Prevention Initiative has been implemented in New Orleans post-Hurricane Katrina under the direction of the Recovery School District to reduce levels of truancy, increase graduation rates,…

Chronic truancy can have dire consequences from crime and unwanted pregnancy to drug abuse and poor economic futures. Mental illness, lack of parental support, unwanted pregnancy or marriage issues, undocumented immigrant status, drug abuse, and crime are reasons students become chronically truant. Accountability measures passed down from the…

This article presents the results of a program evaluation of an Early Truancy Intervention (ETI) program in elementary schools in a southern school district. The ETI represents a cooperative effort between a southern district State Attorney's Office, and public elementary schools in the largest county in that district. The results indicate a…

In 2008, a large southeastern school district was awarded an $8.5 million Safe School/Healthy Students (1999) federal grant. The grant, titled Success for All Students (SFAS) (2008) was a collaborative effort between the school district and county commissioners with the shared goal of increasing student achievement and healthy development by…

Sixty-four federal Elementary and Secondary School Counseling (ESSC) program grants were awarded in 2009. One awarded school district implemented a comprehensive school counseling program based on the ASCA National Model at three high-needs elementary schools. This case study describes a district initiative that provided prevention education for…

The effectiveness of a school-based truancy court intervention in four middle schools in a mid-sized school district was evaluated. Cumulative data from 185 youth attending a truancy court from 2004 through 2008 were included in the analyses. Results indicated a differential impact of the truancy court intervention depending on truancy severity at…

The purpose of this non-experimental correlational study was to determine the relationship between the type of attendance policies in the high schools of the 67 Florida school districts, the size of the school district (number of high school students), the socioeconomic status SES) of the school district, and the average daily attendance rate of…

This research is a follow up to a similar study published by the Center for Rural Pennsylvania in 2003 in which researchers examined alternative education policies and practices among Pennsylvania school districts. The current study extended the previous research to include information on the perceptions of administrators and teachers on the…

Purpose: The purpose of this research is to discuss the issue of managing and reducing school absenteeism and truancy. Design/methodology/approach: The article proposes the development and implementation of some long-term strategic approaches to tackling truancy and other forms of non-attendance from school. This article focuses on the innovative…