Why do alternative education students have a hard time with being present or on-time to school? I have been in alternative education for eleven years. I have seen many students drop out and fail on a regular basis. Why? It is because these students do not come school. Attendance and truancy is a huge problem in alternative education and it reflects the students lack of motivation and discipline in their lives. If these students are not present, these students are unable to listen to lectures, complete assignments, or even ask for the missing work. These types of unmotivated students already have issues with education or they would not be in an alternative educational setting.
Our district has an attendance policy which allows a student to miss up to seven days. After three tardies, the student will receive an absence as well. Now the policy does state that a student, who has gone over the seven days, must carry a D- in the class and get a C+ or better on the final exam to receive credit for that course. As I looked through my attendance book I noticed that 3/4 of my students have gone over the seven days and 1/2 of those students are failing and will probably not pass the course. What a shame and what a waist of time, right?
What is the underlying problem? These students continually make excuses for their lack of responsibility and effort for not coming to school. These students are unmotivated even when they're in a class and what scares me is what they may be doing when they are't in school? How are they going to be even if they graduate from school? Will they skip work or show up late? If they do, these students will be released (FIRED) and most likely bounce from job to job, while creating a poor resume. Someone help me, what can I do to get my students to come to class?
I hold my head up high for the teachers that can teach in an alternative school. I taught in a middle school for 14 years. Two of the years we taught the over-aged 8th graders. These students were 15-17 years of age and had really given up on themselves. We set up contracts for each one of them. We planned outtings that took them out of the norm of the classroom to learn about science (we went to the river not far from school and studied the different living things and non living things. We had special speakers come in and sit and talk with them. You probably have tried these type of things but they worked for us. Out of 30 students 28 of them graduated and approx. 10 of them went on to college. The others got jobs and for the most part are doing ok. The attendance was our problem also, we had to get the parents actively involved and we set goals for them so they had something to work towards. Hang in there! I know you probably think you are not making a difference, but you are.
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