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1999 SESSION

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HB 1817 Truancy and compulsory school attendance; penalty.

Introduced by: Phillip A. Hamilton | all patrons    ...    notes | add to my profiles

SUMMARY AS PASSED: (all summaries)

Truancy and compulsory school attendance; penalty. Makes a number of revisions to the truancy and compulsory school attendance statutes. The measure (i) allows intake officers to proceed informally on a complaint alleging a child is in need of services, in need of supervision, or delinquent in certain instances involving violations of certain school attendance requirements; (ii) requires attendance officers, in addition to making a reasonable effort to notify the parent of the pupil’s absence, to obtain an explanation for the absence; (iii) requires principals or their designees, after a pupil has been absent for five days for the school year without indication of the parent’s awareness and support of such absence, to make a reasonable effort to ensure that direct contact is made with the parent by the attendance officer to obtain an explanation and explain to the parent the consequences of continued nonattendance; (iv) requires the attendance officer, the pupil, and the pupil’s parent to jointly develop a plan to resolve the pupil’s nonattendance; (v) requires a conference to be scheduled, after an additional unexcused absence, to resolve issues related to the pupil’s nonattendance; (vi) empowers attendance officers to enforce these new provisions by making a complaint alleging the student is a child in need of supervision or instituting proceedings against the parent relating to violations of the compulsory school attendance law; (vii) directs school principals to report annually the number of pupils by grade level for whom a conference between the pupil, his parent, and school personnel has been scheduled because of no indication that the pupil’s parent is aware of and supports the pupil’s sixth unexplained absence; and (viii) makes initial violations of the various nonattendance trigger days, plan, and conference requirements a Class 3 misdemeanor and subsequent or knowing and willful violations a Class 2 misdemeanor. The punishment for a Class 3 misdemeanor is a fine of not more than $500 and the punishment for a Class 2 misdemeanor is confinement in jail for not more than six months and a fine of not more than $1,000, either or both.


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